oH -^.i 



. <'j 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE 
HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



BY ' 

GAILLARD HUNT, LiTr.D.,LL.D. 



ILLUSTRATED 




HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 

MCMXIV 



COPYRIGHT 1» M BY HARPE R a BROTHERS 

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

PUBLISHED OCTOBER. 1914 



OCT 29 /9I4 

'CU3872(U 



TO 
RIDGELY HUNT 

MY ELDEST BROTHER and KINDEST FRIEND 
I DEDICATE THIS BOOK AS A TOKEN 
OF MY AFFECTION AND GRATITUDE 



CONTENTS 



CHAP. PAGE 

Preface ix 

I. Peace i 

II. A New Order 8 

III. The Land 15 

IV. The People 19 

V. Ourselves as Others Saw Us 27 

VI. As We Saw Ourselves 34 

VII. A Man's Body at Auction 39 

VIII. Coach and Sloop 48 

IX. Turbans and Pantaloons 58 

X. Women 73 

XI. Plays and Songs 85 

XII. Common People 98 

XIII. The Sunshine of Humor 107 

XIV. "Religion, or the Duty We Owe TO Our Creator" 114 

XV. Webster's Speller 124 

XVI. Reading and Writing 139 

XVII. Pirates and Debtors 153 

XVIII. Vice 171 

XIX. The Wicked 188 

XX. The Poor and Sick 194 

XXI. Doctors 201 

XXII. Cooks 215 

XXIII. Discontent 228 

XXIV. Excrescences 239 

XXV. The Government 248 

XXVI. The President 259 

XXVII. Patriotism 273 

Bibliography 280 

Index 289 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



Henry Carroll 

The Octagon House 

View of New York Bay from the Battery, 1822 . 

From a Booking-list 

Boston Exchange Coffee-house 

Waterloo Inn. The First Stage from Baltimore 

to Washington 

The Capitol in 1814 

The White House in 1814. South Front . . . 

Afternoon Dress 

Walking-dress 

Promenade Dress 

Evening Dress 

Wall Street, Corner of Bjioad Street, Showing 

Custom-house, First Presbyterian and Trinity 

Churches 

City Hotel, Broadway, New York, 1812 . . . . 

A View of Charleston 

View of City Hall, Park Theater, and Chatham 

Street, 1822 

Joel Barlow 

Noah Webster 

The City Prison, or Bridewell, West Side City Hall 
The Debtors' Prison, Subsequently the Hall of 

Records 

Edward Livingston, Author of the Criminal Code 

for Louisiana 

Mrs. James Madison 

James Madison 



Frontispiece 



Faci 



ng p. 



4 
30 
48 
50 

54 
60 
60 
64 
64 
64 
64 



68 
70 

72 

90 
142 

142 
168 

168 

190 
268 
268 



PREFACE 

THIS book was written at the request of the 
Committee of One Hundred to celebrate one 
hundred years of peace between Great Britain and 
the United States at the city of Washington, and is 
a contribution to that celebration. It is a sketch, 
drawn in outline, of life and manners in the United 
States in the year when peace was made with Great 
Britain, and this nation started upon a career of 
separate, independent national development. I have 
suggested some of the causes of the development, and 
have portrayed the character of the people in a gen- 
eral way. I hope I have been able to communicate 
some of the atmosphere of the time to my narrative. 
It was an invigorating atmosphere, full of life and in- 
spiration to those who breathed it. We must believe 
that it was, for if it had not been we should not 
now rank among the great nations. 

While I write these lines the minds of all Americans 
are occupied with fearful thoughts of the war in 
Europe. The ebb and flow of the tide of battle are 
watched anxiously from day to day, and we are won- 
dering helplessly what will be the eventual outcome. 
We are conscious that changes in civilization, the 
nature of which human knowledge and human expe- 
rience cannot foretell, are now preparing. At this 

ix 



PREFACE 

period of dreadful uncertainty in the European out- ; 
look our minds may turn with satisfaction to the con- 
templation of that time, one hundred years ago, 
when England and the United States made a treaty 
which recited ohat they wished to be at peace with 
one another. The progress of the spirit of peace be- 
tween the two nations during the century which has 
ensued is a fact which we can accept with full knowl- 
edge that it has been of benefit to mankind. Yet it 
has grown with the strength of the nations. They are 
of more equal strength now than they were when the 
peace was first made. Nor has the friendship been 
due to absence of rivalry and to separation from each 
other. On the contrary, we are rivals in every branch 
of human effort, and the whole length of a boundary 
of each touches a boundary of the other. Yet so 
amicable have the relations between Canada and the 
United States been for the past century that it re- 
quires an effort of memory to recall any differences 
that have arisen. One can walk across the boundary 
line without realizing that he has passed from domes- 
tic to foreign territory, except as he is reminded of it 
by the existence of a custom-house. The most popu- 
lous portions of the United States and Canada are 
separated by the Great Lakes, and the traveler may 
sail them from end to end and see no sign to suggest 
that they are not a highway reserved exclusively for 
peaceful voyaging. Unfriendly feelings must have a 
starved existence when all the outward signs are of 
amity and good- will. The treaty of peace of 1815 
had a far-reaching consequence in that simple agree- 
ment made on April 28, 181 7, by Richard Rush, act- 

X 



PREFACE 

ing for the American government, and Charles Bagot, 
acting for Great Britain, which recites that each gov- 
ernment may have only one small vessel, with one 
small cannon upon it, on each lake, and that "All 
other armed vessels on these lakes .shall be forth- 
with dismantled, and no other vessels of war shall be 
there built or armed." 

Gaillard Hunt. 

Washington, D. C, October g, 1Q14. 



LIFE IN AMERICA 
ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE 
HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



I 

PEACE 

THE treaty of peace which terminated the second 
war between the United States and Great 
Britain was signed at Ghent by the American and 
British envoys on December 24, 1814; and on the 26th 
Henry Carroll, one of the secretaries to the American 
envoys, started for Washington with a copy of the 
treaty, going by way of England, where he met the 
British sloop of war Favorite, on which he sailed from 
Plymouth for New York, January 2,1815. On the same 
ship with him was Anthony St. Jno. Baker, secretary 
to the British negotiators, also carrying a copy of the 
treaty and clothed with authority to ratify it with the 
American government. To insure safe delivery of the 
precious document a second messenger had been sent 
by the American envoys on a ship bound for Chesa- 
peake Bay, but he arrived two days after Mr. Carroll, 
and consequently brought no news. The Favorite 
was spoken off Sandy Hook on Friday evening, 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

February loth, by the British ship Tenedos, having 
been thirty-eight days in crossing. She came up the 
Bay the following day, and Carroll landed at the 
Battery at eight o'clock on Saturday evening and 
went directly to the City Hotel on Broadway near 
Cedar Street. The news which he carried swept 
before him, and within twenty minutes after he had 
landed lower Broadway was illuminated, and men 
paraded up and down the street with lighted candles 
in their hands, shouting that peace had come. At 
noon of Sunday Carroll left New York by post-chaise 
for Washington. He passed through Philadelphia 
just twelve hours later and reached Washington 
shortly after dark on Tuesday. This was fast travel- 
ing, for the distance was two hundred and ten miles 
by the road he took. When the treaty was ratified 
a few days later a copy was sent to New York by 
express, going from Washington to Philadelphia in 
fourteen hours and from Philadelphia to New York in 
nine hours, making twenty-three hours for the whole 
distance ; but this was by relays, and was considered a 
notable feat. 

As late as Sunday, February 12th, there was no 
inkling in Washington that Carroll had reached 
American shores, nor of the news he bore; but on 
Monday evening a rumor of the facts was abroad and 
threw the city into a tremor of excitement. It had 
come by express from Baltimore, and there was doubt 
of its truth, for people feared lest it might be a report 
started by speculators in stocks. Early the following 
evening, however, Mr. Carroll's post-chaise, drawn by 
four horses, came lumbering through Bladensburg, 



PEACE 

on past the ruined Capitol and down Pennsylvania 
Avenue, following for this part of the journey the 
same road that Ross and Cockburn's men had traveled 
when they had entered and sacked the city the summer 
before. It was a clear, cold night, but Pennsylvania 
Avenue was deep with mud, for it had been raining 
all the previous week. So the chaise plunged and 
splashed on in the darkness, imtil it came to the 
house where Carroll's chief, James Monroe, the 
Secretary of State, lived. As soon as Carroll's 
coach had been recognized it was known that the 
rumor of the previous day was true, and a crowd of 
cheering men and boys followed him as he drove 
through the city. Their enthusiasm was partly due 
to an error on their part, for they thought the peace 
had been brought about in consequence of the battle 
of New Orleans. On February 4th the city had been 
illuminated in honor of that victory, and on February 
nth rockets had been set off to celebrate the evacua- 
tion of Louisiana by the British army. The treaty of 
peace had been signed before these things occurred, 
but the news coming soon afterward was inextrica- 
bly interwoven in the popular mind with this final 
triumph of American arms. 

As soon as Secretary Monroe had received the 
treaty from Carroll they went down the street to- 
gether to show it to President Madison. 

The President was not occupying the White House 
at the time. The walls of that structtu-e were stand- 
ing in unimpaired strength, but they were defaced and 
blackened by the fire with which the enemy had 
sought to destroy it four months before. While the 

3 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

work of rebuilding was in progress he was living in th^ 
private residence which Col. John Tayloe had gener- 
ously placed at his disposal. It stood, and still stands, 
at the comer of New York Avenue and Eighteenth 
Street, and is a unique example of the genius as an 
architect of Dr. William Thornton. There is a large 
circular hall on the first floor from which a broad 
staircase winds upward for three flights. The rooms 
are large and cheerful, with bay-windows and curved 
walls; and to obtain these lines of beauty in the in- 
terior the outer walls are several-sided, and the house 
has always been known as the "Octagon House." 
The dining-room is on the right of the front door as 
you enter, and the large drawing-room is on the oppo- 
site side; and here, if he followed his custom, the 
President was sitting, conversing with his wife and 
members of his household, when Secretary Monroe and 
Mr. Carroll were announced. Of course, they were 
talking of peace, and they made no secret of their 
hope that it would come soon. 

In truth, everybody was tired of the war. It had 
worn itself out without either side conquering. The 
American navy had won glorious victories. General 
Jackson had annihilated the British army at New 
Orleans. The disgrace of Detroit and Bladensburg 
had in a measure been wiped out. The contest 
could now be closed with honor, and it was ex- 
pedient to close it. As a matter of fact, none of 
the concrete causes which had brought it on now 
existed. They had arisen in consequence of the 
war between France and England and our neutral 
position. But France and England were now at 

4 



o P) 




PEACE 

peace, we were not neutral any longer, and there were 
no neutral rights to infringe upon. There were no 
war orders, no decrees against oiu* vessels, no seizures, 
no searches for contraband, no paper blockades, no 
impressments of American seamen. We could keep on 
fighting, if we chose to do so, over the abstract ques- 
tion of whether England had had a right to do these 
things and would have a right to do them again. For 
the present they were not being done, and we had 
fought because they had been done, and not because 
England had asserted a right to do them. As for the 
question of expediency, the American government had 
no desire to stand against the undivided land and 
naval forces of England, fresh from their victories over 
France. 

The greatest disappointment of the war had been 
the attitude of many of the people at home. Speaking 
broadly, the South had supported the war; the new 
West had supported it better than the South; in the 
Middle States there was much opposition to it, and the 
East had opposed it bitterly. At this very moment 
five leading citizens of New England, sent as dele- 
gates from the convention which had met at Hartford 
early in January to formulate measures against the 
war policy of the administration, were on their way to 
Washington, bearing grievances and threats against 
the federal government. 

Although the President earnestly desired peace, the 
last advices from the commissioners at Ghent had 
discouraged his hopes of obtaining it until there had 
been more fighting. He and his envoys thought the 
British envoys were purposely delaying the negotia- 

5 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

tions, believing that New Orleans and the mouth of 
the Mississippi would soon fall into their hands. 
They demanded as a basis of peace that each coimtry 
should retain in its possession such territory as it 
might hold when the war should close. As late as 
October 19th the American commissioners had been 
instructed not to yield to the British demands. 
After further discussion they had been dropped, and 
at the same time the American commissioners with- 
drew their insistence that the treaty contain a clause 
in which Great Britain should expressly abandon the 
right of impressing into her service American seamen 
of British origin. So both commissioners having with- 
drawn the demands which caused contention, there 
was nothing to do but to write a treaty which declared 
that the two countries, having been at war, now de- 
sired to be at peace. The rest of the document was 
detail and a postponement of minor questions in dis- 
pute. The Federalists ridiculed the treaty as soon as 
they saw it, and most historians have dealt with it in 
the same spirit; but time has justified it, for the 
points of difference between the two countries on 
which it was silent have since been settled peacefully. 
The President did not hesitate to accept the treaty, 
and it was no sooner in his hands than he announced 
his satisfaction with it. He was not a demonstrative 
man, and it is not recorded that he uttered any imusual 
expressions of pleasure when he knew that the war 
was over; but it was different with his wife. Dolly 
Madison radiated good nature, and her happiness was 
irrepressible. There are several accounts of what 
took place at the Octagon House that night, when the 

6 



PEACE 

President told his wife that peace had come, which 
may be incorrect in the fact but are undoubtedly true 
in the impression they convey. It is said that she 
announced the fact to all the house by shouting, 
"Peace!" that some one rang the dinner-bell and 
shouted, "Peace!" that Miss Sally Coles, a cousin of 
Mrs. Madison's, who was living with them, went to 
the head of the basement stairs, where the negro 
servants were crowded, and shouted, "Peace!" that 
they took up the cry. Presently guests began to 
arrive, and the house was thronged with people who 
had one word upon their tongues — "Peace." 



II 

A NEW ORDER 

WHEN Mrs. Madison's dinner-bell rang in honor 
of peace it was not known that it was ringing 
out an old order and ringing in a new ; that a turning- 
point in the destiny of the country had been reached ; 
and that it was now for the first time fairly starting 
on a career, separate, independent, and its own. The 
days of ascendancy and control of its fathers were 
over. They had passed off the stage or were limping 
useless upon it. The Declaration of Independence 
had been signed thirty-eight years before, and only 
six of the signers survived — ^Jefferson, John Adams, 
Charles Carroll of Carrollton, William Floyd, and 
William Ellery. All were permanently retired from 
participation in public affairs except Ellery, who held 
the inconspicuous ofhce of Collector of Customs at 
Newport. Elbridge Gerry, who died November 14, 
1 8 14, being at the time the Vice-President, was the 
last signer to hold an important office. None of the 
leading military characters of the Revolution was in 
the public eye except Timothy Pickering, who was 
playing an unpatriotic part. Nicholas Gilman, of 
New Hampshire, who died May 2d, 1815, and Rufus 
King, of New York, were the only members of the 

8 



A NEW ORDER 

Congress then sitting who had served in the Conti- 
nental Congress. 

It was twenty-seven years since the Constitution had 
been framed, and eleven of the forty-one members 
who attended the last sitting of the convention were 
alive. Except the President, only two of them were 
now men of influence — Charles Pinckney, who was 
powerful with the Republicans of South Carolina, and 
Rufus King, who had a following among the moderate 
Federalists of the East. Jared IngersoU, of Phila- 
delphia, had recently been defeated for the vice- 
presidency, but his influence hardly extended beyond 
the circle of lawyers and aristocrats among whom he 
moved. Gouvemeur Morris, old and ill-tempered, was 
cursing the administration's policy, but he had no 
audience. As the membership of the Cabinet had 
changed it had shifted steadily away from the old 
order. Albert Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treasury, 
who had participated in the Revolution and the 
adoption of the Constitution, was succeeded by George 
W. Campbell, who gave way to Alexander H. Dallas, 
and he to William H. Crawford, and none of these had 
been in public service until after the Constitution was 
adopted. Dallas and then Crawford had taken over 
the War Department, after William H. Eustis and 
John Armstrong, both officers in the Army of the 
Revolution, had successively retired. William Pink- 
ney and Richard Rush, the Attorneys-General, were 
too young to have seen Revolutionary service; so was 
Benjamin W. Crowninshield, who succeeded William 
Jones, a Revolutionary soldier, at the head of the 
Navy Department. When Madison left the Presi- 

9 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

dency in 1817 he and James Monroe, his Secretary of 
State, were the only members of the administration 
who had been in public life when the new government 
was started. 

In Congress there had been a revolution, and the 
power had passed into the hands of the young men, 
who controlled the House of Representatives — Henry 
Clay, the Speaker from 1811 up to 1814, aged in the 
latter year only thirty-seven; Langdon Cheves, his 
successor, of the same age; John C. Calhoun, the 
Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, and 
William Lowndes, the Chairman of the Committee of 
Ways and Means, both aged thirty-two; Felix 
Grundy, aged thirty-seven, and a few others who ac- 
cepted their leadership. 

The people had been slow to break away from old 
conditions, for habits of thought are not easily nor 
quickly changed. One hundred years ago there was 
not a man in America over thirty-eight years of age, 
of American birth, who had not been bom a colo- 
nial Englishman. There was not a grown-up man of 
American parentage whose parents had not been bom 
the subjects of a king, and nearly all had been bom 
the subjects of the British king. The people had 
been brought up as colonists and had been stamped 
with the characteristics of colonists when their minds 
were in the plastic state. The Revolution had oblit- 
erated the stamp for a time, but in the quiet of peace 
it had begun to reappear, and many Americans began 
to look at things as they had been accustomed to 
look at them in earlier days. Each man concerned 
himself with his immediate surroundings and the 

10 



A NEW ORDER 

political entity of which he and his forefathers had 
been a part. This had been the colony and was now 
the state. He took an interest, too, in the affairs of 
Europe. For a century and a half he and his ancestors 
had resided in a European dependency, and during 
all of that time European politics had been of direct 
concern to him. He was not yet used to his own 
national government, which had taken the place of 
the European government. It was an experiment 
which he regarded critically, with a feeling of aloof- 
ness and without affection. France and England 
then monopolized the European stage, and it is not 
strange that they should have taken up a great deal 
of the attention of Americans. One coimtry they had 
been accustomed to think of as the mother country, 
and until recently they had called it "home." The 
other had been their traditional enemy, against whom 
their forefathers had waged war almost continuously. 
Recently she had fought with them when they had 
rebelled against the mother country. The usual line 
of cleavage between those whose minds cling to the 
past and who take their lessons from its experience 
and those who put the past behind them and build 
upon the present and the hopes of the future was ap- 
parent. Macaulay's description is as applicable to 
parties in America as it is to parties in England: 

In one sense, indeed, the distinction which then became ob- 
vious [in 1 64 1 in England] had always existed, and always must 
exist. For it has its origin in diversities of temper, of under- 
standing, and of interest, which are found in all societies, and 
which will be found till the hiunan mind ceases to be drawn in 
opposite directions by the charm of habit and by the charm of 
novelty. Not only in politics, but in literature, in art, in science, 

II 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

in surgery and mechanics, in navigation and agriculture, nay, 
even in mathematics, we find this distinction. Everywhere there 
is a class of men who cUng with fondness to whatever is ancient, 
and who, even when convinced by overpowering reasons that 
iimovation would be beneficial, consent to it with many mis- 
givings and forebodings. We find also everywhere another class 
of men, sanguine in hope, bold in speculation, always pressing 
forward, quick to discern the imperfections of whatever exists, 
disposed to think lightly of the risks and inconveniences which 
attend improvements and disposed to give every change credit 
for being an improvement. 



Thus it was that while the country was yet strug- 
gling in the meshes of its old customs there had arisen 
naturally a political party composed of men who re- 
membered their origin and the origin of their insti- 
tutions, who sympathized with England and who 
hated France. They wished to cultivate England's 
good will, and only stopped short of a desire to be 
in political subjection to her again, but in reality they 
were still in mental subjection to her. A French party 
was formed also, composed of radicals who looked 
with intense interest and sympathy upon her revo- 
lution as fully in line with our own, who remembered 
the alliance with sentimental feelings, who hated 
England because of the cruel incidents of the war. 
As the death-struggle of England and Napoleon grew 
fiercer the enthusiasm of the English and French 
parties in this country cooled, for both combatants 
treated American rights with that indifference which 
the rights of the feeble commonly receive. More- 
over, few Americans went so far as to sympathize 
with a foreign nation against their own. The con- 
temptuous treatment we received revealed our fceble- 

12 



A NEW ORDER 

ness as it had not been revealed before. It appeared, 
that we had grown in size, but not in strength. 

Two serving-men in Shakespeare's "Coriolanus" 
are arguing against peace: 

"Ay," says one, "and it makes men hate one an- 
other." 

"Reason," says the other: "because they then 
less need one another." 

It is undoubtedly true that in the long interval of 
peace after the revolution the different sections, states, 
and parties of the country, not having the need of one 
another plainly before their eyes, drifted into a selfish 
rivalry and opposition to one another which engen- 
dered bad feeling and closely bordered upon the land 
of hate. 

A new generation of men who had never themselves 
known colonial dependence came to the rescue. They 
pushed the old leaders aside and led the country, all 
unprepared and disunited as it was, into the war, and 
there it was more united than it had been in peace, and 
soon the English and the French parties disappeared. 
Factional opposition to the war itself, however, be- 
came more dangerous; and, of course, the personal 
jealousies and antagonisms which arose among the 
military rivals were communicated to their followers 
and created bad feeling. The passions of the factions 
had reached the critical stage when the peace came. 
The people were imited in approving that, at any rate. 
They were worn out with domestic quarrels and glad 
to readjust themselves to new conditions. The foreign 
parties were dead; the conduct of France and Eng- 
land had killed them. So was the issue upon which 

13 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the people had split so bitterly — of whether the war 
should be waged. There was no European aggres- 
sion to fear ; the European peace had settled that. Old 
points of difference being dead, there was a season 
when the new points were developing, but were not 
yet plainly obvious — a season of calm between storms 
and of uninterrupted development of material strength. 
The signing of the Declaration of Independence had 
marked the beginning of the nation; the signing of 
the Treaty of Ghent marked the beginning of its 
vigorous young manhood. 



Ill 

THE LAND 

WHEN an American spoke of his country a hun- 
dred years ago he always spoke of it in the 
plural number, having it in his mind as a union of 
separate sovereign states. He had not yet grasped 
the fact that he was a citizen of a continental nation. 
When he bounded the United States he bounded the 
territory of 1783 and nearly always left out Louisi- 
ana, although that enormous domain had been added 
to the United States thirteen years before. When 
the question of buying it was under discussion in 
the House of Representatives in 1802 one of the 
members, Roger Griswold, of Connecticut, truly said 
that the framers of the Constitution had never looked 
forward to an addition to the Union of new territory 
so large that it would overbalance the old territory. 
Nor had the citizens of the old states looked forward 
to it, and they did not understand it. That they 
were beginning to do so was an important circum- 
stance in showing that the consciousness of the na- 
tional destiny had awakened. Already the more ad- 
vanced teachers were telling their scholars that all 
the territory under the federal government might be 
properly included in the term the United States. 
The boundaries of the territory of 1783 were com- 

15 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

monly understood to be New Brunswick on the north- 
east, Canada on the north, the Atlantic Ocean on the ' 
southeast, the Spanish possessions of East and West 
Florida on the south, the Mississippi River on the 
west; but the northeastern boundary line was not yet 
drawn, and there was dispute with Spain over the ex- 
tent of the Floridas. The area was ordinarily com- 
puted as being 1,000,000 square miles, about 1,400 
miles from the northern to the southern boundary, 
about 1,400 miles across in. the northern and about 
700 miles in the southern part. Of the boundaries 
of Louisiana all was uncertainty. The eastern limit 
was put down as the Mississippi River, "which," 
said the geographers, "separates it from the United 
States and West Florida," but they did not agree 
about the other boundaries. One said it was boimded 
on the south by the Gulf of Mexico, on the west 
by New Mexico and unknown lands, on the north 
by lands still possessed by the Indians. Another gave 
the southern boundary as New Orleans, the western 
as New Mexico, the northern as "the unknown re- 
gions." A more detailed description of the western 
boundary was New Mexico and a "ridge of moun- 
tains generally denominated the Shining Mountains, 
which divide the western waters of the Mississippi 
from those that flow into the Pacific Ocean." It 
was generally believed that some part of it extended 
to the Pacific Ocean. The area was computed as 
being more than a million square miles, but how much 
more no one cared to guess. The real area of the 
original territory was only 827,844 square miles, and 
of Louisiana 1,171,931, but our concern is to know 

16 



THE LAND 

what the people thought it was rather than what it 
was. 

In 1815 there was no land-hunger in America. If 
there had been any before the purchase of Louisiana 
the unexpected acquisition of that vast expanse had 
more than satisfied it. It was not until a generation 
later, when a Southern party which desired to in- 
crease its political power by increasing the territory 
which it could control arose, that the appetite for 
more land became a craving with a part of the people. 
It is true that the Floridas were desired; not, however, 
for their terrritory so much as because they were in 
the way of the orderly progress of the commerce and 
population of the United States and were a menace 
to our peace. The symmetry of the sea-coast was 
destroyed by this foreign peninsula between the ocean 
and the Gulf. As soon as Louisiana was acquired 
the fate of the Floridas was sealed. Already the 
government had taken steps to buy them from Spain, 
and five years later the sale was consummated. 

The United States was divided territorially into 
eighteen states and four territories. Vermont had 
been admitted in 1791, Kentucky in 1792, Tennes- 
see in 1796, Ohio in 1802, Louisiana in 1812. The 
organized territories were Indiana, Illinois, Michi- 
gan, Missouri, and Mississippi. Maine was a dis- 
trict of Massachusetts till 1820. Wisconsin was in- 
cluded in Illinois until 18 18, when Illinois became a 
state, and Wisconsin was attached to Michigan. 
Missouri took in everything north and west of the 
state of Louisiana. The area of the whole country 
was understood to be about 2,000,000 square miles, 

2 17 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the extreme length from north to south 1,500 miles, 
the extreme breadth from east to west 2,000 miles. 
The inhabitants proudly said that it was the largest 
country in the civilized world except Russia. The 
great size and unknown extent furnished food for 
their imagination; and now that their attention was 
concentrated on their own affairs they began to see 
the vision of the future and to indulge in bold and 
expansive hopes. That they were well governed was 
recognized by foreigners. "Humanly speaking," said 
one of them, "no circumstance can prevent these 
United States from becoming eventually, and at no 
distant period, a great and powerful nation, influ- 
encing and controlling the other sovereignties of the 
world." 

From every old community in the East adventurous 
young men went forth to explore and conquer the 
unknown country stretching toward the "Shining 
Mountains," and to every old community came back 
the stories of its wonders. The people fed upon 
wonders, and, not unnaturally, came to believe that 
their own wisdom and energy had accomplished things 
which the favors of nature alone had produced. 

"The United States," says the Easy Grammar of 
Geography, published in 1818, compressing all the 
virtues of the nation into two sentences, "are cele- 
brated for the excellence of their Constitution, which 
provides for political liberty and individual security. 
The inhabitants are justly famed for their ardent 
love of freedom, for their hospitality and industry, 
and for the great attention they pay to agriculture 
and commerce." 



IV 

THE PEOPLE 

THE census of 1810 showed that there were then 
7,239,903 inhabitants in the United States, in- 
cluding Louisiana, of whom 1,191,364 were negro 
slaves. By 181 5 the whole population was more than 
8,000,000. For the first ten years of national exist- 
ence (from 1790 to 1800) it had increased by 2,000,000; 
for the second (1800 to 18 10) by 3,500,000; that is 
to say, by 34>^ per cent, for the first ten years and 
36X per cent, for the second decade. By 1830 it 
was 12,866,020; by i860, 31,443,321, and it is now 
about 94,000,000. The most sanguine prophets did 
not prognosticate so rapid an increase. 

It was customary to divide the population ethno- 
logically into three great classes: Eiiropeans and 
their descendants, Africans and their descendants, 
and Indians. The Europeans were of English, Dutch, 
German, French, Irish, Scotch, Swedish, Swiss, and 
Welsh stock. New England and the South, so far 
as its white population was concerned, were inhabited 
almost exclusively by English descendants. One- 
fourth of the population of Pennsylvania were Ger- 
mans, of whom there were many also in New Jersey 
and New York. There were descendants of French 
Protestants in New York and South Carolina and 

19 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

French Catholics in the new state of Louisiana. There 
were Dutch in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsyl- 
vania; Irish in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, 
and Kentucky; a few Scotch in New Hampshire, 
New York, New Jersey, and North Carolina ; Swedes 
in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland; Swiss 
in Indiana Territory; and Welsh in New York and 
Pennsylvania. The Germans in Pennsylvania spoke 
their own language among themselves, but most of 
them knew English. Many of the French in Louisi- 
ana spoke only French. Speaking generally, how- 
ever, the universal language was English, the pre- 
dominant ancestry was English, the predominant 
customs and habits were English, modified by en- 
vironment. The most populous state in the Union 
was still Virginia, with 974,622 people; but New York 
had moved up from the third place, which it had oc- 
cupied in 1790, and was now close to Virginia, having 
a population of 959,949. Pennsylvania was third, 
with 810,091. The population of Virginia had grown 
in ten years by more than 200,000 people, but it had 
only gained 31,860 whites, and in the same period 
New York had gained 372,999 whites, and was now 
the most populous state in the number of white in- 
habitants. Massachusetts was the fourth state, with 
472,040 people. It had gained 50,000 people in ten 
years. Kentucky had jumped from 73,677 to 406,511, 
and Ohio from 42,156 to 230,760. South Carolina 
had 415,110, having gained nearly 70,000 in ten years, 
but of these only 17,946 were white; and in the same 
time New Jersey, with 245,562 in 1800, had gained 
34,000, nearly all of whom were white. It was plain 

20 



THE PEOPLE 

that the old Southern states were losing their su- 
premacy, the movement of population being to the 
North and the West. 

Of the 1,200,000 slaves in the country only 418 were 
in New England. The so-called Middle States had 
147,737, but this included 11,502 in Maryland, where 
slavery was still lawful. There were 15,017 in New 
York, 10,851 in New Jersey, 795 in Pennsylvania, 
4,177 in Delaware, and 5,393 in the District of Col- 
umbia. All the rest of the slaves were in the South, 
including Kentucky and Tennessee. They were dying 
out in the North, where slavery was no longer lawful. 

The Indian population had become unimportant 
in the East. A number of the Iroquois, or Six Na- 
tions, remained on their lands in the western part of 
New York. Wyandots, Delawares, and Shawanese 
had small areas of land in Indiana and Illinois. In 
Michigan and the Northwest territories there were 
many Indians, chiefly Chippewas. The Creeks, Chero- 
kees, Choctaws, and Chickasaws occupied some of 
the most fertile portions of Georgia, Alabama, Missis- 
sippi, and Tennessee; but their power had been broken 
in the recent war, and already it was decreed that they 
must emigrate to the wilderness west of the Missis- 
sippi. It was estimated that there were still between 
70,000 and 80,000 Indians east of the Mississippi. In 
the Western territory there were supposed to be 
80,000 more. 

The densest population was in Massachusetts, 
where the average was 65 people to the square mile; 
in New York State were 20, and only 14 in Virginia. 
In IlHnois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, and the far 

21 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Western territory there were more square miles than 
there were people. 

There were few large cities. New York was the 
largest, with 96,373 inhabitants, having passed Phila- 
delphia, which had been the largest until recently 
and now had 92,247. The third city was Baltimore, 
with 46,555; Boston came next, with 33,250; then 
Charleston, with 27,711. New Orleans (17,242), Salem 
(12,615), ^^^ Providence (10,071) were the only other 
cities having more than 10,000 inhabitants. There 
were ten other cities which had more than 5,000. The 
whole population in cities of over 5,000 inhabitants 
was 406,731, only 6 per cent, of the whole. The pro- 
portion of city population increased steadily there- 
after, and is now more than 40 per cent, of the 
whole. The figiires are enough by themselves to 
show that the people were nearly all farmers. Many 
of them had a fear of the cities, born of ignorance and 
the free play of their imagination, and thought them 
to be centers of luxury and sin, places of gaiety and 
pleasures which turned the heads of girls, made them 
worldly, and tempted them to their fall, and where 
young men were led into dissipation, vice, and crime. 
The influence of the cities was not extensive. People 
traveled little, and comparatively few of them re- 
sorted to the cities often. The dependence upon them 
did not spread far, and their population subsisted 
upon the country immediately around them. The 
newspapers were published in the cities and were 
generally read, but they did not contain reports of 
those phases of life which lure the light-minded and 
viciously inclined. 



THE PEOPLE 

In the country each family was an independency. 
It provided nearly all the food it consiimed, spun its 
own thread, and made much of its own cloth. There 
was exchange at the mill, and sales were made to 
obtain money for hats, shoes, metal ware, agricul- 
tural tools, and a few luxtiries, but in the main the 
household stood alone, and might be cut off from com- 
munication with the rest of the world for months at 
a time without inconvenience. 

The average value of the land for the whole country 
was $io an acre. The highest valuation was in Rhode 
Island, where it was $39 for the whole state. In the 
South, where there was extensive planting, it was 
$4 in Virginia, $2.50 in North Carolina, $8.00 in South 
Carolina, $2.50 in Georgia. In New York large tracts 
were held by individuals under ancient charters or 
by purchase at state sales, and they were rented 
out to farmers for payments partly in produce and 
partly in money, but the rents were low. These were 
the only tenant farmers, all the rest of the land being 
tilled by those who owned it. There were no vassals, 
except as the slaves of the South were vassals. Leav- 
ing them out, there were no large bodies of men de- 
pendent for their sustenance and welfare upon a few 
men and subject to be used by them to further their 
designs, and consequently there were no large bodies 
of men who felt the animosity which dependents feel 
toward those who have power over them. Here was 
a land where men were free politically and indus- 
trially. Diversification of industries and consequent 
complications in the national life were beginning to 
appear, but had not yet come. 

23 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

There had always been some manufacturing in the 
country, and after independence it had been encour- 
aged by protective laws. The second war with Great 
Britain gave it a sudden and irresistible impulse by 
the high prices which manufactured articles com- 
manded and the suspension of the foreign trade, which 
eliminated competition. Manufacturing sprang up 
quickly, especially in New England and the Middle 
States, and in the aggregate employed many persons. 
It was estimated in 1815 that the cotton and woolen 
manufactures, which were by far the largest and most 
important, employed in all about 200,000 persons, 
about 20,000 of whom were men, the rest being women 
and children and boys under seventeen years of age. 
Much of the manufacturing was carried on in families, 
however, the machinery used being simple and in- 
expensive. This was the case especially with cotton, 
wool, and flax. Two-thirds of the clothing and house 
linen of the inhabitants who did not live in cities was 
of family manufacture. In 1820, after the impulse 
to manufacturing had become settled, the largest 
number of persons employed in one district in manu- 
facturing was in Huntingdon District, Pennsylvania, 
where 390, distributed through nine establishments, 
were engaged in making bar iron. The largest num- 
ber in one locality in New England was 150 to 250 per- 
sons employed in making window-glass in three glass- 
works — two in Boston and one in Chelmsford. The 
country was far behind England in the use of ma- 
chinery in manufactures. Steam iron-works were 
erected in Baltimore in 18 14; but the motive power 
for all other manufactures was water or hand, whereas 



THE PEOPLE 

steam was already extensively in use in English facto- 
ries. Great aggregations of capital, large establish- 
ments operated by expensive machinery, populous 
commimities composed almost exclusively of factory 
workers, were unknown. So insignificant was the fac- 
tory population when considered with reference to 
the whole that it need not be taken into account in 
forming a conception of the national life. 

The school-book from which I quoted in the last 
chapter spoke of the devotion of the people to com- 
merce as well as agriculture. Such was the case on 
the seaboard, especially in New England, and the 
shippers and seafaring men were an important al- 
though not a numerous part of the population. Dur- 
ing the war some of the sailors had found employment 
in the navy, and many on privateers, and after the 
peace they went back to the merchantmen; but some 
of the capital which had been in the shipping Jiad 
shifted permanently to manufactures. The commerce, 
except when it was interrupted by the war, was greater 
with Great Britain than it was with all other countries 
combined; but when the Spanish colonies in South 
America revolted it was believed that commerce with 
them would soon become the most important of* all. 
An American authority (John Bristed), writing in 
1818 on "The Resources of the United States," said 
"the greatest commercial benefit resulting from the 
emancipation of Spanish America would be the for- 
mation of a navigable passage across the Isthmus of 
Panama, the junction of the Atlantic and Pacific 
oceans. The expense of such ah undertaking would 
not exceed three or four millions, sterling, and Great 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Britain could not more profitably employ twenty or 
thirty thousand of her distressed laborers than in 
executing such a task, under the superintendence of 
competent engineers." 

The idea was not new, but no one seriously advanced 
the proposition that the United States should build 
the canal. 



OURSELVES AS OTHERS SAW US 

THERE was little knowledge of the United States 
in foreign countries in 1815, and not much in- 
terest. The American Revolution had come when 
liberty was the fashion in Europe, when it was dis- 
cussed by popular writers and talked of in drawing- 
rooms; and, with France as our ally, our struggle 
had arrested the attention of the civilized world; 
but the painful struggle of the new nation to stand 
alone afterward was not an inspiring spectacle, and 
received little notice. It was not generally believed 
that we would stand alone long. The cause of popular 
liberty had suffered serious discredit because it had 
assumed a hideous form in the French Revolution, 
and the pendulum had swung back to orthodox mon- 
archical ideas of government. Moreover, the affairs 
of Europeans were in a crisis and engrossed their 
minds. Our second war with England received meager 
attention even in England itself, and still less on the 
Continent. Contemporaneous historians barely gave 
it a paragraph, and there were many intelligent Eng- 
lishmen who had never heard of Andrew Jackson 
even after the battle of New Orleans. Such demand 
for information about the country and its people as 
existed was supplied by a few publications of travel- 

27 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

ers who told their experiences and impressions. Nat- 
urally, the narratives were disparaging, for the rough- 
ness of life and the hardships of travel put the tourists 
in bad humor. It is to be remarked, also, that the 
people of one nation are commonly prejudiced against 
other nations and that travelers are apt to belittle 
all nations but their own. Foreigners were not more 
unfair to Americans than Americans were to foreign- 
ers. The opportunities for observation of the trav- 
elers must also be remembered when we read their 
opinions. Some of them told of what they saw from 
the stage-coaches and learned from their fellow-pas- 
sengers and at the taverns of the road, and knew 
nothing more. A dance held in the pubUc room of an 
inn they recorded as a good example of the amuse- 
ments of the people, and the drunkenness which was 
common among the frequenters of a place whose chief 
business was the sale of liquor was cited as an illus- 
tration of their habits. Thus one writer, Thomas 
Ashe, an EngHshman, said that bigotry was the char- 
acteristic of the people in the Northeastern states; 
that society in the South was in a shameful state of 
degeneracy; that the people were turbulent, aban- 
doned Christians, unnatural fathers, and treacherous 
friends ; that there was no eloquence among the public 
men; and so forth. His observations were valueless 
because they contained hardly a trace of truth. Par- 
kinson, another Englishman, wrote more discrimi- 
natingly, but hardly less severely. We were avaricious 
and unscrupulous, he said, and no transaction brought 
discredit on a man unless he lost money by it. This 
judgment was expressed by most commentators. 

28 



OURSELVES AS OTHERS SAW US 

Isaac Candler, an Englishman who was pleasantly- 
entertained on his travels and wrote sympathetically, 
said we were less sober than the people of the Conti- 
nent, and about on a level in this respect with the 
Irish. Profanity prevailed to a shocking extent. 
Gambling was extensively practised, especially in the 
South, and dueling was more frequent and engaged 
in for less cause than in any country of Europe. The 
women were remarkably virtuous. The people were 
sociable, even to the point of familiarity, and were 
fond of asking questions. In the South they were 
irritable and quick to quarrel. Hospitality was a 
prevalent virtue, and the manners were generally 
agreeable. 

Of course, the Englishmen took notice of the pecu- 
liar use of many words or expressions in America — 
of clever for worthy or obliging, of smart for clever, of 
I guess for I suppose, of elegant for excellent, of I 
reckon for I think or I guess, and similar colloquial- 
isms; but several critics declared the mass of the 
people spoke better English than the mass of English- 
men, and that nowhere was anything heard as bad 
as the whine of Suffolk, the chipping of words of 
Yorkshire, and the guttural of Newcastle. Americans 
did not find an h at the beginning of words where it 
did not exist nor overlook it when it was there. The 
common pronunciation was that of educated Lon- 
doners. They were poor conversationalists, however, 
and inattentive to details. They had no taste in 
architectiire and ornamentation, but the women 
dressed becomingly. 

Perhaps the severest of all the critics, because there 

29 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

was so much of truth in his criticisms, was Felix de 
Beaujour, a cultivated Frenchman who made a pains- 
taking study of the country. Philadelphia, he said, 
was not only remarkable for the regularity of its 
streets, but for the cleanliness of the houses. New 
York wore a smiling aspect and was like a continental 
town; Boston and Baltimore were like English towns; 
Charleston, Norfolk, and New Orleans resembled the 
towns of the West Indies. Of the new capital, Wash- 
ington, all he could say was that it resembled "those 
Russian towns traced in the deserts of Tartary, in 
whose inclosures we behold nothing but naked fields 
and a few glimpses of houses." As for national char- 
acter, the Americans were a mixture of people sprung 
from so many different nations that thus far they 
had none. They had as much vanity as the oldest 
nations in Europe. The latter boasted of what they 
had done and the Americans of what they could do. 
They had no habits of their own. In the Northern 
states they were bold and enterprising, in the Middle 
states light and inconstant, in the South heedless 
and lazy. "A Bostonian would go in search of his 
fortune to the bottom of hell; a Virginian would not 
go across the road to seek it." In the North one 
found English manners ; in the Middle region a thou- 
sand shades had colored English manners ; in the South 
the manners were those of West-Indians. The plant- 
er's life was a continual scene of indolence and dis- 
sipation. Horse-racing and cock-fighting were his 
outdoor sports, gaming and drinking his diversions 
indoors. In the interior west of the Alleghanies man- 
ners were simpler and purer than in other parts. Gain 

30 



OURSELVES AS OTHERS SAW US 

was the subject of conversation among all men and 
the level of all their actions. There was no country 
in the world where there was less generosity of senti- 
ment, less charm of life. Everything was sacrificed 
to interest. All disinterested acts, all talents purely 
agreeable, were looked upon with contempt. An un- 
bridled love of money was the spring of the Republic. 
Everything favored a vile cupidity. Bankruptcy in 
the commercial towns was often the shortest and 
surest roa,d to fortune. In the country and the vil- 
lages good and upright characters were as common 
in the United States as they were elsewhere; but 
high-spirited and lofty souls, great and noble char- 
acters, were rarer. The people had, however, a love 
of liberty, were industrious, and had high regard for 
the laws. The women were better than the men. 
They were beautiful until they were twenty-five years 
old, when their forms changed, and by the time they 
were thirty their charms had disappeared. They en- 
joyed great liberty till they married. Then they 
buried themselves in their families and appeared to 
live only for them. As wives they were faithful and 
thrifty and had none of the vices, but all of the vir- 
tues, of their husbands. The social life was joyless 
and monotonous. He thought the Americans were 
called upon to act a great part in the world, if they 
did not make their appearance on the stage too soon. 
The danger was that they might become the victims 
of their own dissensions and dissolve before they had 
formed into the body of a nation. Mongaret, another 
Frenchman, confirmed the general opinion that the 
Southerners were more dissipated than the North- 

31 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED Yt:ARS AGO 

erners, and more fond of gaming. He, also, thought 
the women pretty and amiable. Mont^^^^^. also a 
French traveler, agreed on this point. He especially 
remarked the love of pleasure of the people of Louisi- 
ana and the deplorable frequency there of duels en- 
gaged in for insufficient cause. A careful estimate 
was made by Mackenzie, a Scotchman, He thought 
that the people of New England were inquisitive, 
that the descendants of the Dutch especially were 
avaricious, that the laboring - classes were better 
dressed and more independent than those of England, 
but the genteeler classes were more slovenly. The 
women were handsome, but not so healthy in appear- 
ance as the English, and their beauty was short-lived. 
The people of the Northern states were plain, honest, 
and industrious; the planters were lazy and self- 
indulgent. There was a deep prejudice between the 
people of the sections. Tobacco was used to excess 
by all classes, and they were generally addicted to 
dram-drinking. They carried the spirit of indepen- 
dence to an extreme and lacked courtesy. There was 
a dead-level of intelligence in the United States, the 
gradation of intellect which existed in England being 
unknown. The laborer was more intelligent than his 
brother in Europe; but the middle classes were not 
so well informed. 

A few German and one or two Italian and Spanish 
travelers recorded their impressions, but they are un- 
important. On certain points the foreigners were 
agreed, and these must be taken as being American 
characteristics palpable to outsiders. We were do- 
mestic in our tastes and fond of family life. Our 

32 



OURSELVES AS OTHERS SAW US 

women were beautiful and good. We were inquisi- 
tive; we were inordinately devoted to making money; 
we were too fond of strong drink; we were too fond 
of gambling; we were industrious in the North, but 
lazy in the South ; intelligence was well diffused among 
us, but we produced few great characters; we neg- 
lected the light and agreeable things of life. They 
were fond of quoting this remark: "American theory 
is at least two centuries in advance of American 
practice." 

As for the coimtry itself, those who passed over it 
hardly saw more than the landscape and generally 
underestimated the fertility of the soil, while they 
appreciated the wonderful scenery. 

As I have said, liberty was not the fashion for the 
moment, so the American goveiiiment came in for 
condemnation because it had not power enough, es- 
pecially in the executive branch. The general verdict 
was that the President ought to be given greater per- 
manency of office, that there was an excess of liberty, 
the people being all and the government nothing. 
The elections were thought to be too frequent. As 
a consequence the Representatives were too dependent 
on their constituents and too local in their policy. 
Moreover, the constituencies were kept in an incessant 
turmoil of corrupting electioneering. The Union was 
in danger of breaking, because of the growth of sec- 
tional feeling engendered by the existence of slavery 
in one part. The West, too, when it became powerful 
would probably separate from the East. 



VI 

AS WE SAW OURSELVES 

WHEN we came to judge ourselves Northerners 
and Southerners were prejudiced in their esti- 
mate of one another, and they then constituted the 
two great divisions of the people, the new West not 
yet having formed into a separate group. Southern- 
ers had no sympathy with the hard frugality of the 
North. Having slaves for laborers, large holdings of 
land by individuals, and a climate without a long, 
rigorous winter, frugality was not necessary with 
them. They found the leveling of classes of the North 
disagreeable, being accustomed to an aristocratic or- 
ganization of society with a recognized higher class. 
They were fond of saying that there were few gentle- 
men in the North, and they used the word "gentlemen" 
in the same sense that Englishmen used it. They 
superintended their farms or engaged in professional 
pursuits, and the interests of a commercial people 
and of farmers who worked their own land seemed 
petty to them. In short, they thought themselves 
superior to their Northern neighbors. These remarks 
apply to the ruling class of Southerners, who owned 
the property and shaped the destiny of their part of 
the country. The poorer classes had no power, but 
they, too, disliked the Northerners. They knew very 
little about them and commonly associated them in 

34 



AS WE SAW OURSELVES 

their minds with the Yankee peddlers who came 
among them occasionally and cheated them. The 
Southerners were often men of affairs, but they were 
seldom writers, and the product of their printing- 
presses was small. The result is that the record of 
their opinions is meager. 

The home of the writers was then, as it is now, New 
England, and an investigator has not far to go to 
learn what they thought of themselves and of all other 
Americans. Even the most cautious and fair among 
them were outspoken in their reprobation of slavery 
and the effect it had upon the people of the South, 
making them lazy and arrogant, causing them to 
pursue pleasure too eagerly, thus encouraging gaming 
and conviviality, giving a tone to their character 
which placed them at a disadvantage when they 
were compared with the people of the North. Com- 
ing to more specific judgment, they found the planters 
of Maryland imperious and proud, "an almost nec- 
essary consequence of slave-keeping," but hospit- 
able, with manners as polished as those of English 
country gentlemen, and generally of liberal education. 
The Virginians west of the Blue Ridge were indus- 
trious and temperate; east of the mountains the great 
planters were hospitable and of independent spirit, 
but idle and intemperate in their habits, and the 
lower orders were ignorant and abject. Here there 
was great disparity of fortunes and intellectual ac- 
quirements. The North-Carolinians were hospitable, 
but had no taste for learning, and temperance and 
industry could not be reckoned among their virtues. 
Among the lower classes the barbarous custom of 

35 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

rough-and-tumble fighting prevailed, as it did in the 
rest of the South and the West and in a less degree in 
the wilder portions of all the states, when the adver- 
saries bit, scratched, and kicked as well as punched 
each other, and tried to blind each other by the hor- 
rible practice of "gouging," which consisted of forcing 
a man's eyes out of their sockets with the knuckles. 
This practice excited a great deal of comment, but 
the extent to which it prevailed has probably been 
exaggerated. North Carolina was said to be remark- 
able for the early marriages of some of its citizens, 
grandmothers not more than twenty-seven years old 
being occasionally met with. In South Carolina the 
fertility of the soil made the acquisition of wealth easy. 
Many people were rich and addicted to convivial 
pleasures and licentiousness. They were naturally 
quick and vivacious, but lacked enterprise and per- 
severance. They were open-handed in giving, highly 
polished, and well educated. The women lacked the 
bloom of the North, but had an engaging softness 
and delicacy of appearance and manners and were 
possessed of polite and elegant accomplishments. 
Charleston was famous for the gaiety and conviviality 
of the inhabitants, and many families there made a 
great display of wealth and taste. The Georgians 
were generally pronounced to be lazy, a result of the 
hot climate. Of Louisiana little was known I'^^^but 
the peculiar population, in which people of French 
origin predominated, was looked upon as essentially 
foreign and not yet within the circle of American life. 
Of the character of the people of New England 
the highest opinions were entertained; and justly, 

36 



AS WE SAW OURSELVES 

although they came from New England men. There, 
they said, the people were nearly all of English de- 
scent, and the English language had been preserved 
piu"e and free from the corruptions which had crept 
into it in the Middle States, where the proportion 
of foreign-bom residents was so large. The popula- 
tion were mostly of the middle class and escaped the 
vices of the rich and the sufferings of the poor. They 
were hardy and independent, and so jealous of their 
liberties that they were often the victims of imag- 
inary grievances and groudless suspicions against the 
government. They were accused of impertinent in- 
quisitiveness, but it was really only a form of their 
desire for knowledge. It was true that they were 
frugal in their personal expenses; but they were lib- 
eral in expenditiu-es for public purposes. Especially 
were the people of Connecticut fortimate, for the in- 
dividual holdings of land were small. There was a 
degree of political tranquillity in that state greater 
than in any other. They enjoyed as perfect indepen- 
dence and equality as any people in the world. But 
the state scandalized the country by the number of 
divorces it granted. They were the consequence of 
a law passed in 1667 permitting divorce for three 
years' wilful desertion by the husband or the wife. 
Many were arranged by mutual understanding. The 
immigrants who were building up the new West came 
largely from New England, so it could appropriately 
be called a nursery of men. As for the women, they 
were educated in housewifery, assiduous in household 
employments, and occupied their leisure hours in 
reading books of useful information. 

37 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

The people of the Middle States presented varia- 
tions which made it difficult to characterize them as 
a whole. In New York the Dutch descendants were 
noted for their conservatism and refusal to adopt im- 
provements in agriculture. The large landholders 
lived like Englishmen, There were many New Eng- 
land people, and the most prevalent characteristics 
were those of New England. New York City had a 
social life as agreeable as any on the Continent. Al- 
ready the turbulence and corruption of its elections 
were remarked upon. In Pennsylvania the popula- 
tion came from so many sources that general remarks 
could not be applied to it. The people were for the 
most part plain, frugal, and industrious, these being 
the qualities of the Germans to a notable degree. 
There had been a great deal of enterprise displayed, 
and much over-trading in consequence, with ruinous 
results. Of New Jersey there was a general verdict 
that the people were industrious, but paid little at- 
tention to education. The western part of the state 
traded with Philadelphia, and East Jersey with New 
York, so that manners in the former were like those 
of Philadelphia and in the latter like those of New 
York. 

As for the people of the new states and the West, 
they were like the people of the states from which 
they had come. Kentuckians resembled Virginians; 
Tennesseeans, North-Carolinians; and the settlers in 
Ohio were like the people of Connecticut. 

The hard judgment which the people of the two 
sections rendered of each other was due to the pres- 
ence of slavery in one section. 



VII 

A man's body at auction 

AS this is a true picture of our country one hundred 
i\ years ago, a chapter on slavery must be written ; 
but the task is not so repulsive as it would be if we 
were considering slavery in America forty years later, 
when intelligent and well-meaning men were extolling 
it as a beneficent institution and trying to make it 
national in scope. In 1815 it was considered every- 
where to be a local problem. It had existed in all of 
the colonies at the time of the Revolution; but each 
of the Northern states had abolished it by a gradual 
process, the first being Massachusetts and Pennsyl- 
vania in 1 780 and the last New Jersey in 1804. There- 
after it existed only in the Southern states, including 
Delaware, and the few slaves still remaining in the 
Northern states were a negligible quantity. Nobody in 
the South defended it. The greatest apostle it had at 
a later period, John C. Calhoun, had already entered 
upon his public career, being one of the leaders of the 
House, but no word of defense of slavery came from 
him until some years later. George Mason's denunci- 
ation of it in the federal convention of 1787 was a 
correct statement of Southern sentiment then and 
for many years afterward. "Slavery discourages 
arts and manufactures," he said. "The poor despise 

39 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

labor when performed by slaves. They prevent the 
immigration of whites, who really enrich and strength- 
en a country. They produce the most pernicious 
effect on manners. Every master of slaves is bom a 
petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of Heaven 
on a country. As nations cannot be rewarded or 
punished in the next world, they must be in this. By 
an inevitable chain of causes and effects Providence 
punishes national sins by national calamities." There 
is not much to add to this sweeping paragraph from a 
Virginia planter and slaveholder. 

As for the negroes themselves, they were better off 
as slaves in America than they had been as savages 
in Africa, and none of them wished to be sent back. 
Their morals were lax, their education was neglected, 
and their religious practices were crude; but in all 
these respects they were far in advance of their fathers 
and brothers on the Gold Coast. So far as food, medi- 
cal attendance, clothing, and the amoimt of work 
exacted of them were concerned, speaking generally, 
they fared as well as the lowest class of free laborers. 
Again speaking generally, they had no feeling of ani- 
mosity toward their masters. Although the masters 
sat in deathly fear that they would mutiny, subse- 
quent events showed that there was never any real 
danger from this soiu-ce. For the most part they 
were treated humanely and even indulgently. If 
the planter lived on his plantation he did not allow 
the overseer to ill-use them. The house-servants near- 
ly always experienced kindness, and between them 
and their masters and mistresses there were strong 
ties of affection. Public opinion strongly reprobated 

40 



A MAN'S BODY AT AUCTION 

cruelty to the slaves. The laws recognized them as 
having some of the rights of men. Under the na- 
tional law five negroes were equal to three whites in 
computing the representation in the Lower House 
of Congress. In the states very severe laws existed 
designed to keep them in subjection; but the laws 
protected them also. The masters had no power of 
life and death over them, and could be punished for 
excessive cruelty. Nevertheless, individual cases of 
cruelty from the coarser members of society and those 
having charge of the slaves of others were common. 
But above all other cruel things that they had to 
endure was the cruel fact that they were slaves. Kind 
treatment, affection, improvement in mental, material, 
and moral condition, easy work — none of these things 
could cause them to forget, even for an instant, that 
they were bought, bred, and sold like brutes, and 
that they were men. Nor could any circumstance of 
expediency and the knowledge that they were not 
responsible for the imposition of the iniquity, nor any 
appeals to history and the Gospel, cause the owners 
to forget that it was a wrong for one man to hold an- 
other in bondage. These owners were proud of their 
record in the Revolution; they regarded themselves 
as peculiarly the guardians of freedom; they were 
orthodox m their religious views and believed that the 
earth was made especially for man. They held the 
sentiment which Walt Whitman wrote sixty years later : 

A man's body at auction (For before the war I often go to 
the slave mart and watch the sale). 

I help the auctioneer, the sloven does not half know his busi- 
ness. Gentlemen, look on this wonder: 

41 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Whatever the bid of the bidders they cannot be high enough 
for it. 

For it the globe lay preparing quintillions of years without one 
animal or plant. 

For it the revolving cycles truly and steadily roll'd. 

The old President had been the master mind of the 
convention which framed the Constitution and had con- 
tended against any recognition in it of slavery, and 
the vi^ord, if not the fact, was excluded. He had agreed 
then with George Mason's views which I have quoted, 
and he never changed his mind. Henry Clay, also 
bom in Virginia and a citizen of a Southern state, 
already the leader of a great party, denounced slavery 
boldly. David Ramsay, of South Carolina, published 
his history of the United States in 1818, in which he 
said that slavery produced idleness, which was the 
parent of every vice, and, while it caused a few men 
to grow rich, depressed the community to a low sta- 
tion in the scale of national greatness. "Unhappy 
are the people," he said, "where the original decree 
of Heaven that man should eat his bread in the sweat 
of his brow is by any means whatever generally 
eluded." 

These are examples which could be multipUed in- 
definitely. Instances of the defense of slavery at this 
time cannot be foimd, for there are none. 

But if everybody disapproved of the institution, 
why was it continued? The answer is that no good 
plan for getting rid of it was proposed and none could 
be devised. If the negroes were freed they must be 
removed, because they were a permanently inferior 
race which could not fuse with the white race. There 



A MAN'S BODY AT AUCTION 

must come a complete readjustment of society, and 
problems worse than slavery would arise. The slaves 
represented the chief property of the South. Who was 
to pay for them if they ceased to be property? The 
expense would be tremendous and the free states 
showed no desire to share it. A himdred ways of free- 
ing them were discussed, but none seemed practica- 
ble. Moreover, there were a great man}'- people who 
did not want them freed. They did not approve of 
slavery morally or theoretically, but they preferred 
it to the prospects which freedom opened. So when 
emancipation projects came to the issue public opin- 
ion would not support them. 

Mason, Madison, and Clay, were slaveholders. 
So were John Gaillard, the Vice-President; James 
Monroe, the Secretary of State; and George W. 
Campbell, the Secretary of the Treasury. Gaillard 
was president pro tempore of the Senate; Clay was 
speaker of the House till his place was taken in June 
of 1 8 14 by Langdon Cheves, of South Carolina, an- 
other slaveholder. The leaders of the House were 
Calhotm, William Lowndes, and Felix Grundy, all 
slaveholders. William H. Crawford, of Georgia, was 
Minister to France; Thomas Sumter, Jr., of South 
Carolina, to Portugal; two of the four representa- 
tives of the United States to foreign powers were 
slaveholders. The proportion was about what it had 
been since the beginning of the government. Three 
of the four Presidents, two of the five Vice-Presidents, 
fourteen of the twenty-six Presidents of the Senate, 
five of the ten Speakers of the House, had been slave- 
holders. Up to the time of Lincoln's election in 1861, 

43 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

a period of seventy-two years, the President's chair 
was occupied by a slaveholder for fifty years — two- 
thirds of the time. 

Surely, then, if we believe that the United States 
advanced in those years, we must believe that there 
was something of good in the institution under which 
those who governed it while it advanced were bom 
and reared. That good can be stated in a word. It 
was the companion of the evils of the system. As 
George Mason said, every man bom a master of slaves 
was born a petty tyrant ; and as Ramsay said, he was 
bom to idleness and to wealth without laboring for it. 
Thus there arose a class of men accustomed to exercise 
authority over others from their infancy, having time 
to study and to undertake public affairs, having the 
power and prestige of wealth — in short, a governing 
class. The President was one of them. He held his 
first public office when he was twenty-five years old, 
and thereafter was almost continuously in the service 
of the state or the nation for more than forty years. 
Beyond conducting the large farm which he inherited 
from his father, he followed no gainful employment. 
Another was William Lowdnes. A few weeks after he 
was married, when he was only twenty years old, his 
wife's father advised her to leam to keep the plantation 
books, so that she could take charge of her husband's 
affairs. ' ' Before many years, ' ' said he, " Lowndes will 
undoubtedly be called to public life." He entered 
the state legislature when he was twenty-four years 
old and remained in public affairs until a few months 
before his untimely death at the age of forty. 

That country was fortunate which had in its gov- 

44 



A MAN'S BODY AT AUCTION 

emment men like Madison and Lowndes. It was not 
to be expected that many of their colleagues should 
be their peers — that there should be many as pro- 
found scholars of government as Madison or as effec- 
tive legislators as Lowndes — but they had worthy 
associates in John Marshall, the Chief Justice ; James 
Monroe; James Barbour, Senator from Virginia ; Fe- 
lix Grundy, Representative from Tennessee; Wil- 
liam Gaston and Nathaniel Macon, Representatives 
from North Carolina; Calhoun; Clay; Cheves; and 
many others, all Southern slaveholders. 

One influence that operated to produce men of this 
type was the high character of the mothers who bore 
them and the wives who ruled their homes. Among 
the wealthy ruling class the side of slavery which the 
women saw developed their compassion and unsel- 
fishness. They were the ones who improved the 
negroes' morals, taught them religion, and attended 
to their bodily welfare. Before marriage their lives 
were idle enough, but their pleasures were in- 
nocent. They married early and had large families. 
They did not cultivate their minds by much book 
learning, but their characters were developed by their 
duties and responsibilities. Like Mrs. Lowndes, some 
of them managed the business affairs of their planta- 
tions, and most of them had large households with 
many domestic servants, and dispensed a lavish hos- 
pitality. The men might be coarse among men, but 
their Jiomes were refined. Among the pernicious 
effects that slavery had on manners was an increasing 
number of mulattoes. Sensuality among the lower- 
minded men degraded the morals of the negro women ; 

45 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

and at the same time, removing the white women 
from dangers from these men, left them to Hve in an 
atmosphere of purity. The men associated the women 
of their order with their higher and better ideas, do- 
mestic pleasures, charitableness, religion and virtue. 
Although the society was idle and wealthy, it was re- 
markably free from domestic scandals. 

The institution depressed the mass of the people 
in the community, but elevated individuals. Tak- 
ing it with its evil and its good — and the evil far out- 
weighed the good — it must be recognized that it 
played an important part in forming the national 
character and shaping the national destiny. 

It created a fundamentally different civilization 
from that of the North. Here was the strange spec- 
tacle of a country one-half of which based its pros- 
perity on slave labor and the other half ot which owed 
its advancement to free labor. Antagonism was cer- 
tain to arise. The Farmer's Almanac for 1814, printed 
in Boston, had these remarks to make for the month 
of November: 

It has been said that we cannot live without the corn, rice, 
etc., of the Southern planter; but the fact is if we cultivate our 
land as we ought we shall have abundance of breadstuff, and 
there will be no need of depending upon the labor of the poor 
and miserable slaves of the South for our maintenance. 

If the farmers felt so strongly on the subject, it 
was plain that the seeds of disunion sentiments be- 
cause of opposition to slavery were already planted. 
They had not yet, however, appeared aboveground. 
It was only a few years since the Northern states 
had emancipated their slaves, and it was believed the 

46 



A MAN'S BODY AT AUCTION 

Southern states would, one after the other, follow the 
example. At any rate, there was no belief that slavery- 
would spread. It was regarded strictly as a state in- 
stitution and each Southern state might abolish it, 
as each Northern state, acting by itself, had done. 
This was the feeling in 1815, and whatever dissatis- 
faction on the part of any faction existed with the 
Union was not then based upon the existence or non- 
existence of slavery. 



VIII 

COACH AND SLOOP 

NOW the people of the United States were more 
nearly united after the Treaty of Ghent was 
signed than they had been at any time since the close 
of the Revolution, but they still looked at many things 
which were really national from a sectional point of 
view. Because the sections were so far away from 
each other, and knew so little of each other, they were 
jealous and were constantly playing for advantage. 
One example of the feeling which, while it was dimin- 
ishing and was not universal, was prevalent will suf- 
fice. Because the capital had been located on the 
border of Virginia a writer said it was "calculated to 
entail upon the state of Virginia the chief sway and 
influence over all the rest of the Union, and to check 
the career of the Northern and Middle states, whose 
far superior capacities, both physical and moral, in 
population, wealth, industry, and intelligence, would 
eventually sink Virginia into the rank of a second-rate 
sovereignty, if the seat of the national government were 
on the Northern line and the Northern states were per- 
mitted to avail themselves of all their agricultural and 
commercial advantages. Whereas now, the Virginians 
having the seat of government within their own terri- 
tory, made it the focus of their own political intrigues; 

48 



COACH AND SLOOP 

and by managing the people withindoors in the dif- 
ferent states, they return nearly what members to 
Congress they please, and induce them to legislate 
in accordance with the scheme of Virginian policy; 
which never has been favorable to large and liberal 
views of commercial enterprise." Thus there was be- 
lieved to be antagonism of interests between the 
sections, and consequent suspicion of motives and 
harsh accusations instead of friendly rivalry and 
emulation of members of the same family having 
common interests. It was inevitable that it should 
be so, however, when the people lived far apart and 
few could travel. Between New York and Phila- 
delphia, the two chief cities, there was more travel 
than there was between any other two points in the 
country. Four stages started from either city for 
the other each day, or daily except Simdays, A 
"Pilot Stage" left every morning at five o'clock, 
and traveled the distance in from fourteen to sixteen 
hours. The fare was ten dollars, and seven passen- 
gers could be carried in summer. The "Commercial 
Stage," which went every day but Sunday, carried 
the same number. It left New York at seven in 
the morning, stopped at Trenton for the night, and 
reached Philadelphia at seven the following morning. 
The fare was six dollars. The "Mail Stage" charged 
ten dollars and carried only six passengers. It left 
New York at one o'clock every afternoon and arrived 
in Philadelphia at six the next morning. Carrying 
seven passengers at ten dollars fare for each, the "Ex- 
pedition Stage" left New York daily at four o'clock 
in the afternoon, stopped at Bridgetown or Milton 
4 49 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

for the night, and arrived in Philadelphia the fol- 
lowing afternoon. The stage office was at No. i 
Cortlandt Street, in New York, and the stages stopped 
in Philadelphia at the Mansion House, City Hotel, 
and Mail-Stage Office on South Third Street. They 
were ferried over the Hudson River at New York to 
and from Powles Hook, or Paulus's Hook, now Jersey 
City, from the foot of Cortlandt Street, by the steam 
ferry-boat. The boats ran every half -hour and the 
fare was 12 cents for a foot passenger, carriages being 
from 75 cents to $1.50. Between New York and 
Brooklyn there was a horse-boat running every fifteen 
minutes, the fare being 4 cents per passenger. By 
this boat the power which turned the paddle-wheel 
was made by two horses on a treadmill. The stage- 
coach fare did not include the road expenses. Break- 
fast cost 62>^ cents; dinner, with table drink, 75 
cents; supper and lodging, 87^^ cents. 

In addition to the stages were three steamboat 
routes between New York and Philadelphia. By one 
the boat left the north side of the Battery at New York 
at five o'clock in the morning, the passengers break- 
fasting at Elizabethtown, dining at Trenton, and ar- 
riving at Philadelphia in the evening. The fare was 
$8. By another the passenger left New York at ten 
in the morning, dined at Bridgetown or Milton, 
supped and lodged at Trenton, breakfasted at Bris- 
tol, arriving in Philadelphia at ten or eleven. The 
fare was $5.50. Yet another, charging the same fare, 
left New York at three o'clock in the afternoon, and 
reached Philadelphia at ten or eleven the following 
morning. The boats went by the sound and canal 

so 



COACH AND SLOOP 

to Elizabethtown or New Brunswick, where stages 
carried the passengers to Trenton or Bristol, some 
thirty or forty miles, when they took another boat 
on the Delaware, arriving in Philadelphia at the wharf 
on the north side of Market Street. The Olive Branch 
Philadelphia Steamboat Line left New York at 7 a.m., 
went to Brunswick, stopping at Blazing Star Ferry 
and Perth Amboy on the way, and from Bnmswick 
to Philadelphia, being due at eleven o'clock in the 
morning. Passengers breakfasted and dined on board 
and the land carriage was only twenty-five miles. 

There was much travel between New York and 
Albany, the stage taking three days, but the steam- 
boats, of which there were now several, only took 
twenty-four hoiu^s. Between New York and New 
Haven there was a good water route which Soiind 
steamboats traveled in eighteen hoius, the fare being 
$5. There was a stage between New York and Bos- 
ton, leaving the City Hall in New York at six in 
the morning, going through Rye, Stamford, Nor- 
walk, Fairfield, and New Haven, the first day ; Hart- 
ford, Tolland, and Ashford the second day; Pomfret, 
Thompson, Douglass, Mendon, and Dedham, the 
third day ; arriving at the Exchange Coffee House in 
Boston on the third night. The fare was $16. The 
fare by stage from New York to Baltimore was $18, 
and to Washington, $24. 

The "Pilot Stage" from New York belonged to 
what was known as the "Philadelphia, Baltimore, 
and Washington City Lines," which had a continuous 
service between those cities. From Washington there 
was a popular line of stages to Richmond. It started 

51 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

in the morning from Mr. Semmes's tavern in George- 
town, took up passengers at O' Neil's tavern, the 
Franklin House, and Indian:Queen Hotel in Washing- 
ton, and arrived at the Bell tavern in Richmond in 
twenty-four hours. The average time taken on the 
main roads by the mail-stages, which were the fastest, 
was, between the great commercial towns, 60 to 120 
miles in twenty-four hours, by cross-roads 40 miles in 
twenty-four hours. From this it can be seen that a 
joiirney from Washington to Boston, which was 460 
miles distant by stage, took a week, and that to go from 
Washington to New Orleans, which, by the quickest 
route through Richmond, Raleigh (N. C.), Columbia 
(S. C), Augusta (Ga.), and Mobile (Ala.), was 1,219 
miles distant, must take nearly a month. There was 
a post-road between Washington and New Orleans; 
there was one even from Robbinstown on the north- 
east boundary in the province of Maine to St. Mary's 
on the southeastern extremity, a distance of 1,733 
miles. Of course, there was great variation in the 
badness of the roads. Some of the main roads run- 
ning out from the larger cities were fairly good in 
summer, but the cross-roads were bad, and all of the 
roads were bad part of the time. In many parts of 
the country there were no regular stages and a trav- 
eler must use his own carriage and horses or hire them. 
The easiest and quickest mode of travel was by horse- 
back, and in some places it was the only way possible. 
The expense of travel was considerable, as the fares 
recited show. The meals varied much in price, but 
were higher between New York and Philadelphia 
than elsewhere. The average was about twenty -five 

52 



COACH AND SLOOP 

cents for each one, and the night's lodging cost about 
one dollar. Travelers incurred less danger from high- 
waymen than there was in England at this time ; but 
a single rider ran great risk of being killed by Indians, 
unless he was in the well-populated part of the coun- 
try. They seldom attacked a stage-coach, however, 
and on the frontier traveling was generally done in 
parties for protection. 

The coaches were strongly built, the body being 
swung on strong leather straps for springs, but they 
were subjected to a tremendous strain, ploughing 
through deep mud, plunging into holes, bumping 
over rocks and stumps, and often they broke down. 
Although they were not swung high, there was weight 
on top and they sometimes overturned. There were 
few bridges over the streams and fording some of them 
was dangerous, and when the current was swollen a 
coach was sometimes swept down the stream and the 
passengers might be drowned. If a passenger were 
of a peaceful disposition he need fear no personal mol- 
estation; but if he were truculent he might have a 
fight at almost any stopping-place, for at the inns 
were many bullies and rowdies who preferred fight- 
ing to any other form of excitement. 

The conversation on the road and in the inn par- 
lors ranged over a variety of subjects, but it was 
quite sure after a time to come around to political 
affairs, where all met on common ground and in which 
all took an interest. Feeling strongly and drinking 
as they talked, a conversation often rose to a quarrel 
and ended in a fight. The inns on the line of travel 
were all bad, but especially so in the South, where 

S3 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

there was so much entertaining of travelers in private 
houses that the innkeepers could hardly make a living. 
For long distances and for transporting families, 
travel by sea was preferable to land travel, where 
it was possible. The vessels varied greatly in size, 
being sloops or schooners, but none were large. Few 
of them carried more than thirty passengers. They 
sailed at irregular intervals, according as they ob- 
tained their cargo and passengers. After the news- 
paper announced that a ship would sail she might 
wait a week or a month before she was ready. Her 
destination could not always be assured. For ex- 
ample, she would sail from Savannah "to an Eastern 
port (as may be most convenient to make)." It took 
about two weeks to sail from New York to Savannah ; 
from New York to Charleston, about ten days; from 
Savannah to Charleston, from three to five days; 
from Charleston to Wilmington, North Carolina, about 
as long; from Philadelphia to Charleston, about ten 
days; from New York to Boston, about four days; 
from Norfolk to New York, not less than two days. 
The ships were tolerably well-fitted; but, of course, 
a voyage which included for the longer distances the 
doubling of Cape Hatteras was not undertaken for 
pleasure. From what has been written it is plain that 
only a small proportion of the people ever went far 
from home, and their means of communication by 
mail were proportionally difficult and expensive. To 
send a single letter not more than 30 miles cost 8 
cents; over 30 and not more than 80 miles, 10 cents; 
over 80 and not more than 150 miles, 123^^ cents; over 
150 and not more than 400 miles, 18 J^ cents; over 

54 



COACH AND SLOOP 

400 miles, 25 cents. For a double, triple, or quadruple 
letter, double, triple, or quadruple postage was charged. 
It cost I cent to send a single newspaper 100 miles, and 
i^ cents above 100 miles. The charge for pamphlets 
and magazines was i cent per sheet (sixteen pages) for 
50 miles; and lyi cents for 50 to 100 miles; and 2 
cents above 100 miles. Every one tried to avoid pay- 
ing postage by sending letters by the hands of travelers. 

A few boys of the wealthier classes were sent away 
from home to be educated; but even the great col- 
leges were in the main local institutions. Princeton 
was the only one which had as many students from 
other states as it had from New Jersey, but they 
were principally from contiguous states. Some South- 
em boys were sent to Northern colleges, but no North- 
em boys were sent to be educated at the South. Thus 
the class of 1816 at Yale, which was typical, had 36 
members from Connecticut, out of a total of 54; 7 
from the contiguous state of Massachusetts; 3 from 
South Carolina; and i from Virginia. 

Now, though each community was isolated, the 
isolation was irksome to the people, and they were 
bending their attention to the problem of how to over- 
come it. Stage lines were being multiplied, roads 
were being improved and new ones opened. Canals 
and internal improvements were being projected. 
There was an epidemic of steamboat construction. 
Beginning on the Hudson, the boats were now on the 
Delaware and Potomac; arrangements were being 
made to put them on the Mississippi and the Ohio, 
and to send them across the seas was seriously talked 
of. A great change in this respect had come over the 

55 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

spirit of the people in the last twenty-five years. In 
1787 John Fitch's boat, which William Thornton had 
made to go successfully, had plied the Delaware, but 
the interest in it was so feeble that Thornton had 
thought it useless to take out patents. When Robert 
Fulton put very much the same boat on the Hudson 
in 1809 the public mind received it with enthusiasm 
and it was the mother of a flock which soon crowded 
the inland waters. But until steam should be applied 
to locomotion on land the utmost efforts to shorten 
distances must have very limited results. A horse 
was still as swift as a steamboat, and horses could 
not go long distances at a rapid rate. In 18 14 John 
Stevens applied to the state of New Jersey for a char- 
ter for a railroad between New York and Philadephia, 
but it was not till fifteen years later that a locomotive 
ran. Travel in 181 5 was still in a primitive state. 

But the individuals in the isolated communities 
were close to one another in their relations, under- 
stood one another, and sympathized with one another. 
As people who followed the same occupation could not 
co-operate except in the same place, there was no 
class co-operation. The specialization which has been 
brought about by shortening of distances, encour- 
aging minute divisions of labor, could not exist. As 
we have seen, the people were nearly all agricultural- 
ists, and a farmer's occupations, interests, and knowl- 
edge must be diversified when he lives at home and 
supplies nearly all his own needs. The communities, 
too, were so small that the members were in constant 
personal association. If a man built a house he di- 
rected the operations himself, selected the materials 

56 



COACH AND SLOOP 

himself, and if he was a proprietor and did not actu- 
ally wield a hammer or saw, he himself employed 
those who did and paid them with his own hand. 
He saw the planting done, if he did not himself throw 
the seed; he dealt directly with those who bought 
the product of his land. He knew his neighbor. Be- 
nevolence and charity were personal. The poor, im- 
fortimate, and distressed appealed to the well-to-do 
of their neighborhood and received assistance directly. 
In consequence of the individual intercourse there 
was no class antagonism. In reading the letters 
written at this period we are constantly reminded 
of the great breadth of interest of the individuals who 
wrote them — going from public affairs to the proper 
methods of shoeing horses; from classical literature 
to the best way of preparing lumber for building pur- 
poses. The many functions of a man's nattue were 
exercised and his characteristics had room to develop. 
The civiUzation of steam and electricity has raised 
the general level of cultiu-e, but it may well be doubted 
whether it has not lessened the opportunities for the 
highest individual development. In 1815 men were 
not in constant and almost exclusive contact with 
others of the same class as themselves, doing the same 
things, having the same interests, and influencing 
one another to a general sameness; as one of Kings- 
ley's characters put it, "rubbing off their angles against 
each other, and forming their characters, as you form 
shot, by shaking them together in a bag till they 
have polished each other into dullest uniformity." 

Undoubtedly the world has grown since 18 15, but 
the individual has withered. 

57 



IX 

TURBA*JS AND PANTALOONS 

ONE morning during the second session of the 
First Congress John Adams, the Vice-President, 
took a seat beside Charles Carroll of Carrollton be- 
fore he called the Senate to order, and began to ques- 
tion him about his estate in Maryland. He persisted 
in speaking of it as an empire and in treating Carroll 
as if he were a baron ; and he seemed to derive personal 
satisfaction from the fact that he presided over a 
body which contained several barons. William Ma- 
clay, a Senator from Pennsylvania, one of the earliest 
members of the Republican party, sat near by and 
heard Adams's remarks with disgust. He had been 
disgusted ever since the Senate had convened, how- 
ever, for it had been more exercised over the question 
of the proper title to apply to the President than by 
any other subject. Adams and a majority of the 
Senate wanted him called "his Highness," or "his 
Mightiness," or by some other lofty designation, and 
had been saved from the blunder only by the disagree- 
ment of the House. If they had had their way some- 
thing corresponding to a court circle might easily have 
been created. The resounding title of the head of the 
state would have encouraged the use of high-soimding 
titles by the lesser ofi&cials. These titles would have 

58 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

conferred prestige in private life, and public office 
would have been sought for that reason. A priv- 
ileged class might have grown up. 

Maclay and his followers were right in objecting 
to the introduction of undemocratic titles as danger- 
ous to liberty. Nevertheless, John Adams and his 
group were not royalists. If there were any such in 
the country they were a few unimportant individuals, 
who supported their views in parlor conversations 
and did not dare to seek the public ear. Adams be- 
lieved that dignity and authority should attach to 
office, and he liked the trappings of power, but he 
went no further. Charles Carroll voted with Maclay 
for the simple title for the President. Titles meant 
Httle to him and other large landholders and slave- 
owners of the South. They belonged to a class whose 
power and prestige were undisputed, and titles could 
add nothing to their supremacy. 

It must be remarked, however, that, using the word 
"society" as meaning the more cultivated members 
of a community in their social relations to one an- 
other, their private intercoiu-se and recreations, it has 
never been democratic in its constitution, nor admitted 
that all men are equal, and one hundred years ago 
it was less democratic than it is now. Here many of 
the forms and observances which had prevailed in the 
days of the king and a court circle lingered long af- 
ter they had disappeared from public life. Congress 
might refuse to call the President his Highness or 
his Mightiness, but the ladies persisted in calling his 
wife "Lady" Washington. As late as 1815 they often 
spoke of Mrs. Madison as "her Majesty." As soon 

59 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

as the government gave the President a house to live 
in, nearly everybody called it "the Palace" or "the 
Great House," and when his wife held a reception 
they called it a "levee" or a "drawing-room." 

In 1815 the head of society in America was generally 
held to be the President's wife, and the primacy of 
the White House began with the reign of Dolly Madi- 
son. When John Adams and his wife had moved 
into it in the first year of the century it was hardly 
finished and they disputed possession with the work- 
men. The city of Washington was in a state of chaos, 
and there was no society for Mrs. Adams to lead. 
During Jefferson's administration the house had a 
master, but no mistress. His daughter, Mrs. Ran- 
dolph, was with him most of the time, and Mrs. 
Eppes, another daughter, part of the time, but he 
was an overshadowing personage, who dominated in 
every sphere, and the White House was his rather 
than theirs. 

It was not fully furnished till Mrs. Madison and 
Benjamin H. Latrobe equipped it in 1809, spending 
eleven thousand dollars for the purpose. It cost 
three thousand dollars to furnish the great reception- 
room, known as the East Room. When they had 
finished their labors the interior of the house pre- 
sented a pleasing appearance in harmony with the 
perfect taste of the exterior. When it was lighted 
up for Mrs. Madison's first reception in May, 1809, 
a thousand wax candles glittered from the chande- 
liers, and the scene was really beautiful. The house 
became the gathering-place for society in Washington, 
which was considered to be the best the country af- 

60 




THE CAPITOL IN I8I4 

Redrawn from an old print 




THE WHITE HOUSE IN 1814. SOUTH FRONT 

From a contemporaneous print 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

forded and was called "the first circle in the nation." 
The mistress of the White House followed the cus- 
toms of her time, and was neither above them nor be- 
low them. She dressed in the fashion and loved beau- 
tiful clothes. She played "loo" and other games of 
cards for money, as other ladies of her class did, until 
she entered the White House and felt that the exam- 
ple might be harmful. She painted her cheeks, which 
was not considered to be a crime. She took snuff, 
which was a common practise among women as well 
as men. When she got old she remained the same 
age for several years at a time. 

To show what clothes a fine lady wore, a descrip- 
tion of her costume on the day her husband was in- 
augurated may be ventured. At the reception after 
the ceremonies she "was drest in a plain cambrick 
dress with a very long train, plain round the neck 
without any handkerchief, and a beautiful bonnet 
of purple velvet, and white satin with white plumes." 
In the evening at the inauguration ball she had on 
"a pale bufE-coloured velvet, made plain, with a very 
long train, but not the least trimming — a beautiful 
pearl necklace, earrings, and bracelet — her head-dress 
was a turban of the same." 

A few years later, in 1811, a visitor to the White 
House said, "Her Majesty's appearance was truly 
regal, dressed in a robe of plain satin, trimmed elab- 
orately with ermine, a white velvet and satin turban, 
with nodding ostrich plumes and a crescent in front, 
gold chain and clasps around the waist and wrists." 
To piu"sue the subject a little further, a young lady 
who went to the peace ball given in Boston in 

61 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

1815 in honor of the Treaty of Ghent must be 
quoted : 

"I wore," she says, "a sheer dotted muslin skirt 
trimmed with three rows of plaited white satin an 
inch wide. The bodice of white satin was also trimmed 
with the same ribbon. I wore white lace round the 
neck, a bouquet, gold ornaments, chain, etc. My 
hair was arranged in braids, bandeau, and curls." 

The admiration for oriental things was a dom- 
inant note and showed itself in the ugly turbans 
which Mrs. Madison and other ladies wore, but deli- 
cate Cashmere shawls, graceful tunics and mantles, 
were also the fashion. Some of the turbans were 
made of spangled muslin and others of bright-colored 
cloth, and from the center of a few glittered a precious 
stone. There was a passion for gems and jewelry. 
Women twined long gold chains about their necks 
four or five times. They wore bracelets, armlets, 
and earrings. Instead of the turban some wore droop- 
ing ostrich plumes in their hair, or bound it with 
ribbons or a narrow band of gold. It was the fashion 
to gather it at the back in a knot, as it appears in 
Greek statues, and this style was known as "turning 
up the hind hair close." In front it was often worn 
in curls or ringlets, and a few had it cut and curled 
tightly over the whole head. Wigs were coming into 
fashion for women, having passed out for men. A 
pleasing adaptation of the Greek costumes was af- 
fected. The gowns were cut low in the neck and a 
muslin ruff rose behind the head, but they himg in 
graceful, natural folds. Tight lacing was not in 
vogue, because the "round gown," as it was called, 

62 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

was gathered a short distance below the shoulders 
and did not show the lines of the waist. The gloves 
came up to the elbows, and the kid or silk slippers 
barely covered the toes and had no heels. In England 
at this time, when a fine lady went to court she wore 
an enormous dress puffed out with a thousand frills 
and flounces, but no especial costume was prescribed 
for the White House. The skirts of the older women 
trailed on the groimd, but long trains, as we saw them 
at a later day, were not worn. The skirts of the girls 
barely reached to their ankles. 

The costume for men was in a transition stage, and 
it was not until many years later that the fashion 
of a special uniform suit for evening wear came in. 
Pantaloons had been affected by the radicals of Paris 
during the French Revolution and had found their 
way to America, but here they never rose to political 
importance. By 1815 they had come into general 
use with the yoimger men, but the older ones adhered 
to breeches and long stockings. There was, there- 
fore, great variety in the costumes of a gathering of 
men. Some wore square-skirted coats, and others 
a newer style of coat made of blue or green cloth 
with large gilt or pearl buttons, a high rolling collar, 
and long narrow tails reaching down to the calves. 
Beau Brummel had already introduced starch into 
the neckcloths of Europe, and the fashion had reached 
America. Shirt-collars were prodigiously high and 
reached to a man's ears. Some wore "pudding cra- 
vats" designed to make the chest look deep, but 
stocks were coming into use. A few old men still 
powdered their hair, but others parted it on the 

63 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

side and wore it cut long. A few fops had it 
curled. 

There was general interest in the social life and 
everything else pertaining to the city of Washington. 
It had been deliberately planned and artificially made, 
instead of coming into existence naturally from the 
needs of the surrounding country or as a port for 
shipping. It was the common property of all the na- 
tion, and everybody had an opinion about it. It de- 
served little praise and received none. Foreigners 
and Americans made it a butt for their wit, and it 
is doubtful if any other city in the world was ever 
so peppered with epigrams. 

Here are some of the criticisms taken at random 
from an inexhaustible supply. One of the early dog- 
gerel rhymes said that it was a place 

Where the houses and kitchens are yet to be framed, 
The trees to be felled, and the streets to be named. 

In 1806 the poet, Tom Moore, called it 

That fam'd metropolis where fancy sees 
Squares in morasses, obehsques in trees. 

A few years later the Abbe Carrea da Serra, Por- 
tuguese minister, whom President Madison called 
"the most enlightened and esteemed foreigner among 
us," said it was "the city of magnificent distances." 

It was a sorry place to look at. The broad streets 
were unpaved and most of the houses were cheap 
and mean. The few public buildings were classic 
in design, but they were framed in a ragged waste. 
The parks existed only in the plan. Yet there was 

64 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

an agreeable social life in the city, and a compact 
society was built up from the various elements. The 
high Federal officials were the dominant class. It 
is true that they embraced many degrees of culture 
and lack of culture, especially among the Senators 
and representatives. There is an account of a Wes- 
tern Senator who saw a pianoforte for the first 
time and was as curious concerning it as an Indian 
would have been, but other Senators powdered their 
hair, drank old Madeira, and quoted Horace. They 
were particular about being called upon, and had 
quarrels over precedence. There was a group of 
army and navy officers always in the city, and they 
were generally well-educated and entertaining com- 
panions. The stationary inhabitants comprised a few 
high officials, several himdred government clerks, 
who occupied a more important place in the city's 
life then than government clerks do now, a small 
diplomatic corps of not more than a dozen people, 
and a few wealthy landholders and resident families, 
chiefly in Georgetown, who had been on the scene 
when the government arrived and acted in some sort 
as hosts. 

The society was held together by two generally ac- 
cepted principles. One was that a man of high rank 
in the government service was entitled to privileges 
and prestige in private life, and the other was that a 
member of a family which had enjoyed social privi- 
leges for several generations had a vested right to 
their continuance. Every one was proud of the new 
coimtry and esteemed it a privilege to associate with 
the officials who governed it. To attain public office 
5 65 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

was then almost the only goal of an ambitious man. 
Wealth was powerful, as it has always been, and was 
sought after, but it was not by itself all-powerful, and 
to pursue it was not regarded as the sole business of 
life. Many people were getting rich, it is true, but 
the time of the mad race for money and the accumu- 
lation of vast fortunes had not arrived, being reserved 
for a later generation, when machinery, steam, quick 
locomotion, and instantaneous communication of in- 
telligence produced combinations of interests and co- 
operation of effort, opened limitless markets, resulted 
in greatly increased production and fabulous profits. 
The industries in the isolated communities of 1815 
were strictly circumscribed in extent and the profits 
were not large. 

The respect which generally maintained for mem- 
bers of old families was a survival of the colonial 
times, the lingering of a habit which came from the 
days of privileged classes. It was supported by the 
agricultural foundation of society. Where nearly all 
men were farmers, one who had a large farm was a 
man of consequence. The stability of country life 
produced family cohesion and families were then a 
power in every direction. The history of New York, 
for instance, up to this time is concerned largely 
with the history of the relations between the Living- 
ston and Clinton families; and in several Southern 
states a few rich families monopolized the public 
offices. 

So an agreeable and well-selected society existed 
in Washington. It was a generation later, when the 
new West — where men had grown up unoppressed by 

66 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

visible social restraints — came into control, that the 
doctrine of political equality was held to carry with 
it social equality and the removal of the barriers which 
had separated groups of people in private life. To 
be specific, the fabric of Washington society was de- 
stroyed when Andrew Jackson became President. 

The days were not crowded in 1815, and leisure 
fostered social intercourse. Morning calls were paid, 
and the callers stayed long enough for rational con- 
versation. When they gathered together their num- 
ber was small enough to permit of general acquaint- 
anceship. Even at the inauguration ball there were 
only four hundred people present. In the large cities 
there were occasionally as many at a public ball; 
but a private entertainment was considered to be a 
very large one if there were two hundred guests. 

Men of standing in the community did not esteem 
the affairs of society to be unworthy of their atten- 
tion. In 1802 Capt. Thomas Tingey, an officer of 
high standing in the navy; John Peter Van Ness, 
lately a representative in Congress; Samuel Harrison 
Smith, founder of the National Intelligencer; Dr. 
William Thornton, the first superintendent of the 
Patent Office and the designer of the Capitol, and 
several others of similar rank — organized the Washing- 
ton Dancing Assembly, which continued in existence 
for many years and gave dancing-parties at short 
intervals during the winter season. There were simi- 
lar organizations, managed by men of prominence, in 
all the large cities. The amusements of society were 
not left to the exclusive control of idle and frivolous 
people. 

67 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

When Philadelphia ceased to be the capital some 
of the spirit which had made it the gayest and most 
luxurious city on the continent departed from it and 
the severity of the old Quaker life reasserted itself, 
but it was still an agreeable place to hve in. Sub- 
scription dances or assemblies were begun there in 
1749 by an association which, omitting the period 
of the Revolutionary War, has been giving them ever 
since, and is thus the oldest dancing organization in 
the United States. 

There were a number of foreign dancing-masters 
in Philadelphia, as there were in other cities. They 
taught the cotillion, a lively French dance, executed 
by any number of couples performing evolutions or 
figures, as in the modem german, the menuet de la 
cour, the waltz, — which was new and was received 
with some doubts of its propriety — Highland reels, 
fancy jigs, which were not often seen in polite circles 
of society, and American country dances which were 
like our Virginia reel. 

The Philadelphia assembhes began promptly at 
six o'clock and stopped at midnight. They were 
attended by the older people as well as the young men 
and girls, card-tables being always provided for those 
who did not care to dance. The difficulty of finding 
a suitable place for the assemblies was solved at this 
time by making use of the Mansion Hotel on Third 
Street. 

It was some years before there was a hotel in Phila- 
delphia in a building constructed for the purpose, 
the Mansion Hotel having been adapted from the 
large town house of the Binghams. The meals which 

68 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

were served were typical of the best hotels. For 
breakfast there were tea and coffee, eggs, cold ham 
and beef, hot fish, sausage, beefsteak, broiled fowls, 
fried and stewed oysters, and preserved fniit. The 
supper was essentially the same as the breakfast, but 
for the dinner roasts of beef or turkey or mutton, 
game, vegetables, puddings and pies, and wine and 
liquors were added. 

The greatest hotel in the country was the new City 
Hotel in New York, which had recently been erected 
on Broadway between Thames and Liberty streets. 
It was five stories high, contained seventy-eight rooms, 
and was regarded as a marvel of size and luxury. 
There was a large assembly-room where dancing- 
parties were held. 

The society of New York was changing and already 
the commercial life of the city was rising to the top. 
The population was about one hundred thousand 
people. It had passed Philadelphia and was increas- 
ing in size at a tremendous rate. Wall Street was re- 
garded as the typical street. The Stranger's Guide- 
Book for 1817 said: 

In Wall Street, which commences at Broadway, crosses Pearl 
Street, and descends to the river, are situated the Banking-houses, 
Custom-houses, Insurance offices, Tontine Coffee-house, the 
offices of Exchange Brokers, and most other public mercantile 
officers. This is a very handsome, airy street. Towards the bot- 
tom, in the neighborhood of Pearl Street, and in front of the 
Coffee-house, the public sales by auction are conducted, which 
renders this quarter extremely busy, and gives a very favorable 
and correct idea of the extensive trade and commerce of New York. 

Like Boston, New York had suffered from the em- 
bargo, but it recovered with startling rapidity, and 

69 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

business went forward so furiously that in a few years 
there was a reaction and a temporary business col- 
lapse. Notwithstanding the obvious commercial 
destiny of the city, the society was still aristocratic. 
Great families, such as the Livingstons, Clintons^ 
Van Rensselaers, Schuylers, and Morrises, domi- 
nated politically and socially and even industrially. 
The social life was gay. A few Dutch customs — for 
instance, general visiting on New-year's day — pre- 
vailed and spread to other cities. Many private balls 
were given. The favorite dining-place for the men 
was the Tontine Coffee-house; the lounging-place for 
people of fashion in the warmer seasons was the beau- 
tiful Battery overlooking the Bay. There were as 
yet no men's social clubs, but a few popular shops, 
to a certain extent, took their place. A man could 
stroll into one of these, meet his friends, and linger 
for hoiirs at a time. In Boston there were several 
shops which were as well known as meeting-places 
as clubs are now. 

In spite of the presence of a Puritanical element 
there was almost as much entertaining in Boston as 
in New York. It had suffered severely during the 
war, as much of its wealth was in shipping, and it 
received the news of peace with wild rejoicing. There 
was a long emblematical procession, and a great ora- 
torio was sung in the concert-hall. On the evening 
of February 24th there was a peace ball which every- 
body, including the gentry, attended. In spite of the 
general evenness of fortune among the people of New 
England, and the consequent democratic natiire of 
the social life in Boston and other large towns, there 

70 




CITY HOTEL, BROADWAY, NEW YORK, l8l2 



TURBANS AND PANTALOONS 

was a perfectly clear dividing-line between the gentry 
and the common people. 

The chief gathering-places for the society of the 
South were Baltimore and Annapolis for Maryland, 
Richmond and Norfolk for Virginia, Raleigh and Wil- 
mington for North Carolina, Charleston for South 
Carolina, and Savannah for Georgia. New Orleans 
was a city by itself, deriving its prosperity from com- 
merce and from the vicinity. It was as much French 
in its characteristics as if it had been in France. 

One Southern city in particular stands out as hav- 
ing the characteristics of the others in an exaggerated 
degree. Charleston was then among the first five 
cities in the country in population, among the first 
three in the importance of its commerce, and with- 
out a rival in the lavishness of its hospitality and the 
luxurious life of the members of its ruling circle. Few 
families in this circle had less than twenty household 
servants, all had coaches and horses, and their ser- 
vants wore family liveries. It is true that the ser- 
vants played as much as they worked, that the 
coaches were not always in repair, and that the liv- 
eries were often shabby, but the masters lived like 
a landed nobility, were treated as a nobility, and often 
spoke of themselves as a nobility. Those who had 
their plantations near the coast were generally called 
the "low-country nobility." Writing some years la- 
ter, John H. Hammond, Senator from South Caro- 
lina, said he wished his sons to be "South Carolina 
country gentlemen, the nearest to noblemen of any 
class in America." In colonial days some of the gentry 
had been in commerce, but as the civilization de- 

71 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

veloped more and more upon a foundation of slavery 
all trade came to be looked down upon as an occupa- 
tion unworthy of gentlemen. It fell almost exclu- 
sively into the hands of foreigners, while the Caro- 
linians planted and went into the learned professions 
and public life. It was the custom for each of the 
wealthy families in Charleston to give a large ball 
every year. In February the races took place, when 
the Jockey Club ball was held, which was the most 
important social event of the year. The city was most 
famous, however, for the dinner parties given. There 
was a good market, so far as fish and game were con- 
cerned ; at any rate, there was profusion ; and gentle- 
men spent a great deal of money on their wines in 
those days. There was a circle of wits, of raconteurs, 
of cultivated conversationalists who gave attention 
to dinner-table accomplishments, who repeated one 
another's good jokes and epigrams, who prepared 
themselves for their contests of wit, and took pride in 
victory. 

There were similar groups in other cities. The 
hoiu-s of leisure, which compelled social intercourse; 
the diversification of occupations and of acquaint- 
ances which gave a wide range to thoughts and in- 
terests; the continued familiarity with the classics 
which educated men were expected to maintain — all 
combined to produce good conversation and to cause 
it to be cultivated. The table talk was better than 
it can be in an age of hurry and of incessant employ- 
ment at one thing. No one thought in those days of 
describing the qualities of a man without speaking 
of his colloquial parts. 



3 ^ 




X 

WOMEN 

A RECENT commentator on American life has 
observed that our political history is notably 
free from the names of women; and he is correct. 
The historian of the United States cannot begin his 
work with an account of a wholesale flirtation, as 
Herodotus, the father of history, began his ; nor is he 
called upon to discuss the wholesale divorces of a 
monarch as a part of the history of a great crisis, as 
an English historian must. It is true that a queen 
as well as a king gave encouragement to Christopher 
Colimibus and sent him on the voyage which resulted 
in the discovery of America, and that it was imder 
another queen, Elizabeth, that the first English set- 
tlements were made, but when we come to America 
itself we find oiu"selves in a land where men have 
been thus far in undisputed political possession. It 
is necessary for oiu" purpose to point out only one 
reason why this is so. It is because there has never 
been a permanent governing class in this country, 
with a permanent society of officials and their fam- 
ilies, in which, as a matter of course, the women 
would be supreme. Whenever the same officials have 
been in power for a long time, however, a society of 
their own has begun, and there have been signs of 

73 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the influence of women in political affairs. Such a 
society was forming in 1815, when the same party- 
had been in control of the national government for 
fifteen years. It grew in force during Monroe's term 
of eight years, which was a continuance of Madison's; 
and when three members of his Cabinet, Adams, Cal- 
houn, and Crawford, were candidates to succeed him, 
each had a coterie of women followers in Washington, 
who exerted themselves to further the interests of 
their favorite. When Andrew Jackson, an outsider, 
became President, Washington society was strong 
enough to try a fall with him. He offended it by 
taking into his Cabinet the husband of a woman whom 
it would not recognize, and it compelled him to send 
the obnoxious couple beyond the seas and reorganize 
his administration. But soon the personnel of Wash- 
ington society was changed, the circle was broken 
into pieces, its power was gone, and women's influ- 
ence disappeared from national political life. That 
influence had been exerted indirectly, however, and 
a woman of polite breeding would have resented a 
charge that she meddled in public aft'airs. "What she 
thought on the subject is illustrated by the remark 
of Mrs. Samuel Harrison Smith, a woman of unusual 
intelligence, to a Federalist whom she met a few hours 
after she had fled from Washington when the British 
invaded the city in 18 14. He said the defeat of the 
Americans was an argument for a standing army, and 
Mrs. Smith replied that she had always imderstood 
that a standing army was an instrument of despot- 
ism; but, she added, "I am not competent to discuss 
such questions, sir." Mrs. Madison herself furnishes 

74 



WOMEN 

another illustration. She enjoyed the friendship of 
more public men than any other woman of her day, 
but there is no record anywhere of her views on pub- 
lic questions, or that she ever influenced the poli- 
tical views or actions of her husband, who was wholly 
devoted to her. We can, in fact, eliminate consider- 
ation of women in any other than their private rela- 
tions when we consider the American women of a 
hundred years ago. "A female politician," said The 
Female Friend, a little book published in Baltimore 
in 1809 under the patronage of citizens of that city, 
Annapolis, Alexandria, Georgetown, and Washington 
— "a female politician is only less disgusting than a 
female infidel — but a female patriot is what Hannah 
More was and what every American woman should 
study to be." 

So the women were domestic, and the home was the 
scene of their activity. The object of their education 
was to attract men, gain husbands, have homes, and 
manage families. Their teaching was entirely dif- 
ferent from that of men. All boys who went beyond 
the merest rudiments must learn Latin and mathe- 
matics, but the girls learned neither, nor Greek, nor 
the sciences, except some geography, astronomy, and 
physics — or natural philosophy, as they called it. 
To give a girl the same course of study as a boy be- 
yond the first reader would have been regarded as 
an absurdity. Addison's description, in the Spec- 
tator, of the accomplishments of an Englishwoman of 
high breeding in 17 12, would have answered with some 
modifications for the daughter of a well-to-do family 
of America in 181 5. 

75 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

She sings, dances, plays on the lute and harpsichord, paints 
prettily, is a perfect mistress of the French tongue, and has 
made a considerable progress in Italian. She is, besides, excel- 
lently skilled in all domestic sciences, as preserving, pickling, 
pastry, making wines of fruits of our own growth, embroidering, 
and needlework of every kind. 



The domestic sciences all of them were taught, 
whether they were rich or poor. When President 
Madison was inaugurated in 1809 he wore a siiit of 
dark - brown cloth made of wool which had been 
carded, spun, and woven by Elizabeth Stevens Liv- 
ingston, the daughter of Robert R. Livingston, of 
Clermont, and her accomplishments were not re- 
garded as exceptional for a woman of her class. 

All women were expected to learn to nurse the 
sick. Professional nurses were not readily obtain- 
able and were ignorant and untrained, so it was the 
custom of women to nurse not only in their own fam- 
ilies but in the families of their neighbors and friends. 
When the qualities of a woman were enumerated it 
was usual to speak of her skill and tenderness as a 
nurse. 

Elementary as it was, the book education of women 
was far better than it had been in earlier days and 
was more generally diffused among them. Women 
wrote well, though their grandmothers had not been 
able to write at all. They read some books besides 
the Bible, and spoke better grammar. They wrote 
very good letters, although they were taught a stilted 
and unnatural style. Their choice of appropriate 
words seemed to be instinctive, their sentences were 
well constructed, and their meaning was clear. 

76 



WOMEN 

The system of education fulfilled its object. Ac- 
cording to report, the girls of North Carolina married 
at such an early age that grandmothers of twenty- 
seven years of age were often met with, but, as a 
matter of fact, early marrriages were usual in all the 
states. Even among the higher classes girls often 
married when they were thirteen. This was a new 
country and there were more men than women, so 
there were few old maids It was a farmer's country, 
productive land was plentiful, and it was easy to 
support a family, so from the early marriages came 
large numbers of children, often a dozen or more from 
one marriage. Widows married again if they were 
yoimg; widowers married again whether they were 
young or old. It was the land of marriage. 

To describe more particularly the position which 
"females," as the contemporaneous authors usually 
called women, occupied, it is necessary to reconstruct 
an archaic condition of society. Rousseau, writing 
his Emilie some years earlier, showed what he thought 
was the object of their education and training, and 
Americans generally were in accord with his view. 

"The education of women," he said, "should be 
always relative to the men. To please, to be useful 
to us, to make us love and esteem them, to educate 
us when young and to take care of us when grown up, 
to advise, to console us, to render our lives easy and 
agreeable; these are the duties of women at all times." 

Americans were a religious people, and the women, 
especially, were orthodox. They put human conduct 
to the touchstone of the rules laid down in the New 
Testament. They accepted the gospel according to 

77 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

St. Paul without protest, even when he told them 
that they must learn in silence, with all subjection; 
that the head of every woman is the man ; that woman 
is the glory of the man ; that the man was not created 
for the woman, but the woman for the man ; that she 
must be a keeper at home, good and obedient to her 
husband ; that she must submit herself to her husband 
as to the Lord. 

The books which were written for the guidance of 
young women and accepted by them quoted this pas- 
sage from Milton: 

To whom thus Eve with perfect beauty adorn 'd: 
"My Author and Disposer, what thou bidst 
Unargued I obey; so God ordains; 
God is thy law, thou mine : to know no more 
Is woman's happiest knowledge and her praise." 

A standard author with them was Hannah More. 
She was quoted, remembered, emulated, and shame- 
lessly imitated. Her philosophy was that of the men 
of her time. One of her ablest essays was on St. Paul; 
but, while she defended him from the charge that he 
opposed marriage, she did not defend his views on 
woman's subordination, because no one attacked them. 

The books addressed to the women tell us what 
was expected of them. They were advised to culti- 
vate the art of conversation so as to be pleasing. 
When a woman married she should resign all claims 
to general attention and concentrate herself upon her 
husband and her home. One author said, she must 
understand in the beginning "that there is an in- 
equality in the sexes, and that for the economy of 
the world the men, who were to be the guardians and 

78 



WOMEN 

lawgivers, had not only the greater share of bodily 
strength bestowed on them, but those also of reason 
and resolution." She was told that unchastity was 
regarded as "superlatively criminal in women," but 
in men was "viewed in a far less disadvantageous 
light." Therefore, the woman who had an unfaith- 
ful husband should not expostulate with him, for that 
would drive him away, but should feign ignorance of 
his misconduct and by superior agreeableness and at- 
tractions win him back. She should never blazon 
forth her wrongs, for she would not have the public 
on her side. Separation from her husband should 
be her last resort. It was a terrible experiment, and 
made the wife responsible for all the vices the hus- 
band might fall into after separation. The great 
duty of woman was to contribute daily and hourly to 
the comfort of husband, parents, brothers and sisters, 
and other relations and friends, to form and improve 
the manners and dispositions of men by her society 
and example; to care for children and mold their 
minds. She was prescribed strong doses in reading, 
most of the books dealing with religion; but she 
could read The Rambler, The Idler, and The Spec- 
tator. Shakespeare was too coarse, but selections 
from his works were permitted. Byron must be 
avoided; but Young's Night Thoughts, Thomson's 
Seasons, Milton, Cowper, and Goldsmith were recom- 
mended. Moral essays, such as Mrs. Chapone's let- 
ters on the Government of the Temper, Knox's essays, 
and, of course, everything of the incomparable Hannah 
More, were considered the best things for her; but 
she was encouraged to read American history — Hutch- 

79 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

inson's History of Massachusetts, Ramsay's History of 
the Revolution, and the Proceedings of the Massachu- 
setts Historical Society being specified as smtable 
works. Of American biography there were the Uvea 
of Franklin and Washington. She was warned against 
novels, but might indulge herself with The Vicar of 
Wakefield, Don Quixote, and a few others. Life was 
a serious affair, and preparation for eternity should 
be made by reading serious, contemplative books, 
such as Dodd's Reflections on Death and his Thoughts 
in Prison, Taylor's Holy Living and Dying, and Little- 
ton's Dialogues of the Dead. I am not writing a 
humorous parody on the education of a young lady, 
but am faithfully transcribing the titles of the books 
which those who directed her reading placed in her 
hands. She accepted these books submissively; nay, 
she even accepted books in which Dean Swift's letter 
to a very young lady on her marriage was printed, 
paraphrased, or plagiarized. The Dean informed the 
"very yoimg lady": "The grand affair of your life 
will be to gain and preserve the friendship and esteem 
of your husband," and admonished her that love is 
"that ridiculous passion which has no being but in 
play -books and romances." Of course, the latter re- 
mark she did not believe, but it is surprising that she 
consented to listen to insults like these: "As little 
respect as I have for the generality of your sex," etc., 
and concerning their fondness for fine clothes: 

So your sex employs more thought, memory, and application 
to be fools, than would serve to make them wise and useful. When 
I reflect on this, I cannot conceive you to be human creatures, 
but a sort of species hardly a degree above a monkey; which has 

80 



WOMEN 

more diverting tricks than any of you; is an animal less mis- 
chievous and expensive; might in time be a tolerable critic in 
velvet and brocade, and, for aught I know, would equally become 
them. 

I doubt whether many women took Swift seriously 
or read the Dialogues of the Dead when the teacher's 
eye was not upon them. I doubt if they cared much 
what men thought their positions ought to be, be- 
cause they knew what it really was; and they were 
willing that men might have the word of sovereignty 
as long as they had the fact. Mary Wollstonecraft 
might protest to the utmost, but they were content 
"rather to be short-lived queens than labor to attain 
the sober pleasures that arise from equality." Their 
condition compared favorably with that of the women 
of other countries. As we saw in another chapter, 
foreign observers spoke of them admiringly, remark- 
ing upon their beauty, industry, and faithfulness in 
marriage. As yet there was no class of rich, world- 
ly, pleasure-loving women, living in an atmosphere 
of vacuity and immorality, such as Hannah More 
and her contemporaries directed their denunciations 
against. There were fast women of fashion, of cotirse, 
but they were not numerous enough to constitute a 
class in any part of the country. The majority fitted 
Hannah More's description, being — 

Those women who bless, dignify, and truly adorn society. 
The painter, indeed, does not make his fortune by their sitting 
to him; the jeweler is neither brought into vogue by furnishing 
their diamonds, nor undone by not being paid for them; the pros- 
perity of the miUiner does not depend on affixing their name to 
a cap or a colour; the poet does not celebrate them; the novelist 
does not dedicate to them ; but they possess the affection of their 
6 8i 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

husbands, the attachment of their children, the esteem of the 
wise and good, and, above all, they possess His favour "whom 
to know is life eternal." , 

We are not to suppose that there were no whispers 
of rebellion from the women against their subjection. 
Those who were not "short-lived queens," not busy 
wives and mothers, whose hopes of sovereignty were 
waning or gone, murmured against an order of things 
which left them derehcts, but there were very few of 
them. 

Mary Wollstonecraft had published her Vindica- 
tion of the Rights of Women in England in 1791, and 
it had been republished in an American edition at 
Philadelphia in 1794. There were a few American 
writers who followed in her train and wrote on woman's 
rights and wrongs, but they had an audience of in- 
significant proportions. Miss Wollstonecraft 's plea 
was for a liberal human education for women, and 
against a system which, she said, was designed to 
make them alluring mistresses rather than rational 
wives and companions of men. She was pitiless in 
her arraignment of women for their complacency in 
their degradation, and of men for their selfishness in 
forming women only with reference to themselves. 
In her power of penetration and logical presentation 
it is probable that none of the myriad women writers 
who have treated the same subject since her day 
have surpassed her. I cannot find that she was much 
read in America, nor heeded at all. She had no 
school here. Her immoral life and tragic death in 
1797 had furnished a concrete argument against her 
philosophy, which negatived her teachings. At this 

82 



WOMEN 

time her daughter was illustrating their effect by her 
unlawful union with the poet Shelley. 

Americans practised marriage freely, but the habit 
of unmarrying had not been acquired and divorce 
was not a national evil. The social life of the country 
existed without this scandal to furnish food for con- 
versation. In 1811 Thomas Law, an eccentric Eng- 
lishman, whose real residence was in Washington, 
established a legal residence in Vermont so as to ob- 
tain a divorce from his wife, Elizabeth Parke Custis, 
a granddaughter of Mrs. Washington. They had 
been leaders of the society of the capital, and their 
separation and marital differences had caused a social 
commotion. This was probably the first instance of 
a divorce in the society of the city, and it stood alone 
for many years. Regular divorce laws were a novelty 
in the coimtry. In South Carolina a divorce had never 
been granted. In New York for a hundred years be- 
fore the Revolution there had been no divorces. That 
state had no law on the subject until 1787, when the 
coiurts of chancery were authorized to pronoxmce de- 
crees from the bonds of matrimony for adultery alone ; 
but the legislatiu-e might do so also; and the law re- 
mained thus for many years. Generally speaking, 
the states in which English customs held most tena- 
ciously were very strict in their reasons for divorce, 
and those which applied rules of their own were more 
free. Louisiana had the liberal laws of the code Na- 
poleon. Divorce was still exclusively a function of 
the legislatures in Delaware, Kentucky, and Mary- 
land. In Georgia the legislature might allow divorce 
by a two-thirds vote of each house, after the cause 

8?, 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

had been tried and a verdict given in a court of jus- 
tice. In the other states it was a function of the 
courts, and the causes for allowing it extended to 
intolerable ill-usage, wilful desertion, and habitual 
drunkenness. In Connecticut it might be granted 
even for misconduct permanently destroying the hap- 
piness of the person applying for the divorce; and 
there conditions were regarded as discreditable, and 
it was charged that divorces were obtained by col- 
lusion of married people. But whatever the laws 
were, they were rarely invoked. 

We have no way of judging of the extent of marital 
infidelity. It was considered to be less of a crime on 
the part of the husband than of the wife, and un- 
doubtedly there were many unfaithful husbands, and 
very few unfaithful wives. Heavy penalties for adul- 
tery — whipping, branding, fining, imprisonment, and, 
in several New England States, wearing the letter 
A sewed upon the sleeve of the outer garment, "of 
color contrary to their clothes," had prevailed under 
colonial laws, but they had given way to less drastic 
enactments. The punishment in Virginia at this 
time was a fine of only twenty dollars. As a matter 
of fact, however, the law was seldom executed for 
this offense. When punishment was inflicted upon 
a man it usually came in the form of death by the 
hand of the dishonored husband, a lawless retribution 
of which public opinion approved. 



XI 

PLAYS AND SONGS 

A PEOPLE in the first flush of young manhood, 
glorying in its vigor, delighting in the struggle 
of life, restless, immature, with an uncontrollable im- 
pulse for action — such a people as the Americans 
were in 1815 — has not reached the stage when it can 
pause to cultivate art or appreciate it. There was 
some classic architecture exemplified by the work of 
William Thornton upon the Capitol, a few good 
painters, especially of portraits, like the Peales, John 
Trumbull, Gilbert Stuart, and Washington AUston, 
and a very few who carved in marble and wood, like 
William Rush. An association for promoting the 
fine arts, chartered in New York in 1808, was lan- 
guishing, but was revived in 18 16 as the American 
Academy of Fine Arts. The Pennsylvania Academy 
of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, chartered in 1806, and 
the Society of Artists of the United States, organized 
in that city in 18 10, were barely alive, but they too 
took on some vigor a few years later under a new 
name. These and a few other similar struggling or- 
ganizations served to make all the plainer the fact 
that America was not then a home for art. That must 
wait for populous cities, a cultured, traveled class, 
the patronage of settled wealth, leisure, and what 

85 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

may be called the contemplative stage of national 
life. 

But there was a general desire for amusement, and 
one form which it took was a fondness for the play. 
The more cultured people went to the theater freely 
and there was no prejudice against it among the 
Irish immigrants; but the middle classes of English 
origin had an inherited fear of it as a dangerous ex- 
citement to the imagination and productive of im- 
moral conduct. To state the matter by religions — 
and nearly everybody was religious — Episcopalians 
and Roman Catholics went to the play without mis- 
givings, but Presbyterians, Methodists, and Baptists 
had a feeling that they ought to be disciplined for 
going, and Quakers did not dare to go. It was be- 
Heved that seven-tenths of the people were opposed 
to the theater, but those of the seven-tenths who 
went, notwithstanding, and the remainder were suf- 
ficient in numbers to support it in all the cities and 
towns. The actors were English or Irish, except in 
New Orleans, where they were French. Not a prom- 
inent actor on the stage in 1815 was an American. 

In 181 1, on the night after Christmas, there was 
a terrible fire in the theater at Richmond, when it 
was crowded with a holiday audience. Seventy people, 
nearly all occupants of the boxes, were burned or 
trampled to death, those in the pit and gallery escap- 
ing unharmed. It was the popular belief that the 
tragedy was a pimishment of God for attending a 
play. The legislature of the state forbade all public 
amusements for four months. Later a church was 
erected on the spot where the theater had stood, to 

86 



PLAYS AND SONGS 

propitiate divine justice. Throughout the country 
the disaster made a deep impression, and it was not 
until 1818 that the drama was revived in Richmond, 
when a new theater was built by James H. Caldwell, 
who had already erected theaters in several other 
Southern cities. 

In Massachusetts all theatrical performances were 
imlawful till 1793, when an act was passed permitting 
them, but in 1799 Connecticut passed a law which 
closed the theater at Hartford. The law had been 
evaded in Boston, and when the ban was lifted the 
Federal Street Theater, a handsome playhouse, was 
opened with appropriate ceremonies. A gold medal, 
offered as a prize for the best poetical prologue, was 
won by Thomas Paine, the son of Robert Treat Paine, 
a signer of the Declaration of Independence ; but soon 
afterward Thomas petitioned the legislature for per- 
mission to change his Christian name to that which 
his father bore, so that he might not have the same 
name as the hated infidel who had written the Age 
of Reason. Paine's prologue was a poem character- 
istic of the taste of the day. It began with a descrip- 
tion of the drama in Athens, passed on to Rome, spoke 
of the dark ages, and then introduced Albion and 
Shakespeare. Next, it was natural to say of the 
Muse: 

Long has she cast a fondly wistful eye 
On the pure climate of the Western sky, 

and presently to land her in Boston. 

In protest against the new playhouse another poet 
offered a prologue running thus: 

87 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

If alien vices here unknown before 

Come, shameless, to pollute Columbia's shore. 

If here prof an 'd Religion's sacred name 

Be dressed in ridicule and marked with shame — 

and much more to the same affect. Such was the 
opposition to the play that a committee of substantial 
citizens of New York refused one hundred dollars 
offered for the poor of the city, because it came from 
the manager of a theater. One peculiar custom pre- 
vailed which justified some of the strictures against 
the theater. A number of the proscenium boxes in 
the large playhouses were given up to the prostitutes. 
There they sat together in a conspicuous part of the 
house, decked out in all their professional finery and 
blandishments. It was a shameless spectacle, which 
friends as well as foes of the stage protested against, 
but which was not abolished till some years later. 
As for the players themselves, they set no worse ex- 
amples than actors have always done. There was a 
goodly proportion of blackguards among them, and 
some of them died of drink. Divorces were very rare, 
but elopements occurred. A few moved in the circles 
of good society and became worthy members of their 
communities. All seemed to take kindly to the new 
country, and most of those who came over to join 
the several good American companies never returned 
to England. There was no difficulty in recruiting the 
companies, the profession having discovered, as an 
American manager expressed it, that "a continent ex- 
isted oversea, called America, where some of the peo- 
ple were white, spoke English, and went to see plays." 
Many of the actors came from provincial boards, not 

88 



PLAYS AND SONGS 

yet having won a London reputation, but there were 
several who would have done credit to any stage. 
Thomas Abthorpe Cooper, a tragedian of merit; Mrs. 
Oldmixon; Mr. and Mrs. Darley; Mr. and Mrs. 
Hodgkinson; Mr. and Mrs. Hallam; Mrs. Merry, and 
Mrs. Whitlock, a member of the famous Kemble fam- 
ily, a sister of Mrs. Siddons and possessed of similar 
talents; and John E. Harwood, who married Miss 
Bache, a granddaughter of Benjamin Franklin — were 
some of the players who were deservedly popular. 
The first great actor to come over was George Fred- 
erick Cooke, in 1811, but he was shattered from dissi- 
pation and died soon afterward. He was followed 
by Joseph George Holman, an actor of equal merit. 
Companies did not travel regularly, but they moved 
from one city to another at intervals, and their per- 
sonnel changed constantly. Stars traveled alone and 
played with different companies. Thus a playgoer 
in a large city saw all the chief actors in the course 
of two or three seasons. 

In some of the theaters there were good orchestras. 
At the Philadelphia Theater the conductor was 
Alexander Reinagle, who played the harpsichord 
in the orchestra. The conductor in New York was 
James Hewitt, a musician of attainments hardly less 
than Reinagle's. Many of the musicians were for- 
eigners of decayed fortune — at New] York, for 
instance, a French nobleman who had fled from 
Paris during the Revolution, a French army offi- 
cer who had made an unfortunate marriage, and 
a refugee from the slave insurrection at Santo Do- 
mingo. 

89 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

A theater comprised the pit, where people of all 
sorts sat on benches, paying for their tickets from 
fifty to seventy-five cents; above this pit was a tier 
or sometimes two tiers of boxes patronized by wealthy 
and fashionable people who paid at least a dollar 
for a seat. Above the boxes was the gallery, where the 
rabble went, paying twenty-five cents each for admis- 
sion. The theater built in Philadelphia on Chestnut 
Street in 1792 was, until it was burned in 1820, prob- 
ably the best in the country. The auditorium was 
semicircular, and there were two complete rows of 
boxes besides the pit and gallery. The Boston thea- 
ter, also a fine one, had a square auditorium, only one 
row of boxes, and held 500 people. In New York 
a theater had been built on Chatham Street opposite 
the park. It had seats for 2,500 people and was the 
largest in the country. It was lighted by many lamps 
and candles in brackets. There was a great orna- 
mental chandelier suspended from the ceiling, and the 
grease from the tallow candles dripped upon people 
in the pit who were sitting imder it. In Washington 
there was a good theater which had been opened in 
1800. 

The bill offered at a theater must please many dif- 
ferent tastes, for there were no folk-theaters. Rich 
and poor, high and low, went to the same perform- 
ance. The play bill of the Richmond theater on the 
night of the fire is typical. Placide, whose benefit it 
was, was a well-known actor-manager and afterward 
played at the theater at Charleston: 



LAST WEEK OF PERFORMANCE THIS SEASON 



MR. PLACIDE'S BENEFIT 

Will CERTAINLY Take Place on 
THURSDAY NEXT 

When will be presented, an entire New Play, 

TRANSLATED FROM THE FrENCH OF DiDEROT, 

BY A Gentleman of this City, called 

THE FATHER 

OR 

FAMILY FEUDS 

[The caste follows] 

At the End of the Play 

A COMIC SONG By Mr. West 

a dance By Miss E. Placide 

SONG By Miss Thomas 

A HORNPIPE By Miss Placide 

To WHICH WILL BE ADDED (fOR THE FIRST TIME HERE) THE 

Favorite New Pantomime of 

RAYMOND AND AGNES: 
OR, THE BLEEDING NUN 

[Follows the caste] 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

A long "description of the principal scenes in the 
Pantomime" follows. Often, however, the after-piece 
was a farce. 

The bill at Richmond shows that there was a fond- 
ness for foreign plays, but the public taste took a wide 
range. Shakespeare, Sheridan, translations and adap- 
tations of the German playwright Augustus von Kotz- 
ebue, were regularly performed. There was a demand 
for American plays, and William Dunlap, the most 
prolific American playwright, produced among many 
others, "Andre," "The Glory of Columbia — her 
Yoemanry," and "The Soldier of '76." Mordecai 
M. Noah, afterward a conspicuous journalist, con- 
tributed "Marion, the Hero of Lake George," "Oh 
Yes, or the New Constitution," "The Siege of York- 
town" ; WilHam Joor, ' ' The Battle of Eutaw Springs " ; 
James N. Barker, "The Embargo, or What News?" 
and the "Indian Princess." The frontier play had 
not yet come into vogue, but the Indian play was per- 
formed. Dunlap had already dramatized the story 
of John Smith and Pocahontas and it served as a theme 
for plays of several other authors. 

The audiences at the theaters often gave interesting 
exhibitions of the public mind. On the night of No- 
vember 25, 1793, the anniversary of the day when 
the British had evacuated New York ten years before, 
there was a remarkable demonstration at the theater 
in the city. Citizen Genet, the first envoy from re- 
publican France, had exchanged congratulatory ad- 
dresses with Governor George Clinton in the course 
of the day. In the evening the theater was crowded 
to hear Murphy's play, "The Grecian Daughter," 

92 



PLAYS AND SONGS 

Mrs. Melmouth taking the leading part. In the boxes 
on one side of the stage sat the French naval officers, 
and on the other side the American officers, all in full 
uniform. The pit was filled with French sailors and 
American militiamen. As soon as the orchestra ap- 
peared the audience called for "Qa ira." The strains 
of that lively air, then the song of the Revolution- 
ists, had hardly begun when the Frenchmen and then 
the Americans began to sing it. 

Ah! ga ira, ga ira, ga ira, 

Le peuple, en ce jours sans cesse r^pete ahl 

Ah! ga ira, ga ira, ga ira. 

Malgr^ mutins tout reussira 

Et nous allons chanter alleluia. 

Ah! ga ira, ga ira, ga ira! 

It is not conceivable that the Americans sang all the 
French words, but a repetition of the first line was 
easy and served all essential purposes. Next came the 
"Marseillaise" sung with solemn enthusiasm while the 
audience stood up. Then came tumultuous shouts and 
coimter-shouts of, "Vivent les Frangois,'* and ''Vivent 
les Americains.'' The curtain rose and the audience 
was silent. In the course of the play the Grecian 
daughter strikes to the earth the tyrant who is about 
to kill her father, and when this part was reached the 
applause became a mighty shout of approval. Old 
theater-goers, indulging in reminiscences many years 
afterward, declared that never had they witnessed a 
scene of such elevated enthusiasm as that which took 
place at the theater in New York on this night. 
Twenty-three years later no foreign cause could have 
aroused such fervor. The public temper had com- 

93 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

pletely changed and "Qa ira" was already forgotten. 

The relationship between the drama and music 
was, of course, intimate, and many of the actors were 
also singers. 

There was no peculiarly American music, but, as 
Mr. Oscar G. Sonneck, the historian of American 
music, has remarked, there was no more reason why an 
American music should be made than there was for 
making an American language. The early settlers 
had their music when they came, and kept it. There 
was a phase of American life that was bombastic 
and pretentious in tone, which the people confused 
with the heroic, and the same audiences which liked 
the "Grecian Daughter" and Paine's prologue liked 
the heavy Presidents' marches, which were composed 
in honor of each of the Presidents and played on public 
occasions, and did service, to some extent, for national 
airs. Better than these, however, was the English 
hymn, "God Save the King," to which Americans 
adapted words of their own from the time of independ- 
ence. As yet, however, no settled version had been 
accepted. In 1798 Joseph Hopkinson, the son of 
Francis Hopkinson, wrote the words of "Hail, Co- 
lumbia," and they were set to the music of the Presi- 
dent's march which Philip Phile had composed in 
Washington's honor. Probably more people knew 
the words in 1 8 1 5 than know them now, for it was bet- 
ter suited to their poetic taste. Francis Scott Key's 
"Star-spangled Banner" was composed to commem- 
orate an incident of the war of 181 2, and sung to the 
a^r of an English drinking-song, which everybody 
knew. "Yankee Doodle" was there, come whence 

94 



PLAYS AND SONGS 

no one knew, and its authorship claimed by nobody, 
but Hked by the gallery and pit, and many other 
patriotic songs with European airs which had become 
natui'alized as American. 

Of indigenous music there could be only that of 
the Indian. The white man liked to learn many things 
from him, especially his woodcraft and some of his 
methods of fighting, but never cared to learn his music. 
In fact, the tonal method was so different that it was 
not music at all to white ears. 

But it was different with the music of the negroes. 
They had developed a local music full of harmony 
and beauty. It was made by welding their native 
chants upon the white man's hymns, lullabies, and 
folk-songs. They were more passionately fond of 
music than the whites. 

Nevertheless, there was much music among the 
people. Many coimtrymen and working - people 
played the fiddle, the frontiersman, according to tra- 
dition, sometimes to frighten off the wolves. The 
boatman, sailing down the river with the breeze 
behind him, leaned against the tiller and fiddled a 
particular tune; travelers often carried a musical in- 
strument with them. Monologues, partly recitative, 
partly sung, and partly played, being humorous de- 
scriptions of travels and adventures, were composed. 
The singing-school where hymn-singing was taught 
was common in New England, and the itinerant 
teacher of psalmody, with a pitch-pipe for his musical 
instrument, was frequently met with in the East. 
For the gentleman the "gentleman's flute" was then 
the fashion, and European travelers often remarked 

95 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

on the skill and taste with which the ladies played 
upon the harpsichord, pianoforte, guitar, or harp. 
Higher music flourished encouragingly. In New Eng- 
land many of the inhabitants still doubted whether 
any singing was not ungodly, unless it was of hymns; 
but concerts had been patronized by the more cul- 
tured people of Boston, and in 1815, on Washington's 
birthday, there was a great musical festival in honor 
of peace with England. An audience of over nine 
hundred persons gathered in King's Chapel at the 
comer of School and Tremont streets to listen to an 
oratorio. The chorus numbered nearly one hundred 
voices, all of them male but ten, and nearly all Amer- 
icans. Already there were piano-makers in that city, 
and a musical journal, The Enter piad, was pubHshed 
in 1820. There had been concerts in Boston for many 
years, and this was true of all the chief cities of the 
country. All of them had musical societies. In 
Charleston the St. Cecelia Society was giving con- 
certs, having been organized for that purpose as early 
as 1762. Here, as in Eiuope, the concerts usually 
closed with a ball, and in course of time to give the 
ball became the chief business of the St. Cecelia 
Society and usurped the place of the concert ; but this 
was after the time of which we are writing. The 
concerts were both vocal and instrumental, and the 
audience listened to Haydn, Pleyel, Davaux, Corelli, 
Karl Stamitz, Handel, and other standard composers. 
The composers in America were not many, but they 
were respectable. William Billings, Andrew Law, and 
Oliver Holden were Americans who had devoted them- 
selves chiefly to psalmody, and Francis Hopkinson to 

96 



PLAYS AND SONGS 

sectilar music. Among the emigrants who had set- 
tled in the country were several men known to musi- 
cal history — besides Alexander Reinagle and James 
Hewitt, Benjamin Carr, Joseph Gehot, and Gottlieb 
Graupner. 

As the theater existed in every city or town, the 
union of music and acting was a natural development. 
Up to 1800 many English operas had been performed, 
and opera went forward rapidly after that. By 181 5 
every city had made its acquaintance. Baltimore had 
seen French opera in 1791, and, beginning in 18 10, it 
was regularly performed in New Orleans, whence it 
made its way experimentally into other cities. 
7 



XII 

COMMON PEOPLE 

ONLY an insignificant proportion of the popula- 
tion of the United States Hved in cities in 1815, 
and a very small proportion worked in factories or 
mills. Universal manhood. suffrage did not exist and 
very few laborers could vote, so there was no legis- 
lation in the interest of labor. There was no labor 
problem, and socialism was unheard of. With a scat- 
tered population extensive combinations of laborers 
were impossible. The working-day was from twelve 
to fifteen hours long, and it was not till ten years later 
that a movement was started to shorten the day to 
ten hours, the motive back of it being humane, but 
not political. There was no legal restriction on the 
employment of women and children, and they con- 
stituted a majority of the employees in the factories. 
There the discipline was what the employers chose 
to make it, and in some instances it included the use 
of the whip upon the women and children to urge them 
to work. Work began at half past four in the morning 
in some mills. In New England the hands were taxed 
by the employers for the support of the churches, and 
continued absence from church services on Simday 
was punished by dismissal. The wages of the men 
operatives were from sixty-five to seventy cents a 

98 



COMMON PEOPLE 

day. There were a few societies of mechanics for 
benevolent purposes — of journeymen shipwrights and 
of house carpenters in New York, for example. Oc- 
casionally there were mutinies in the factories, and 
in 1802 some sailors in New York made a demon- 
stration, paraded the streets with a band of music, 
recruited their ranks from other sailors, and demanded 
an increase in their wages from ten dollars a month 
to fourteen dollars. There was no popular sympathy 
with them ; they were put down with a strong hand, 
and the leaders were lodged in jail. Organized strikes 
were unknown. Some of the cities regulated the work 
and pay for a few services. In New York chimney- 
sweeps were allowed to work in winter only from six 
o'clock in the morning till four in the afternoon, and 
in'the stmimer from five in the morning till six in the 
evening, and no boys under eleven years of age could 
be employed. The price f(^5^feweeping the chimney 
of a high house was fixed af ^ cents. Porters using 
a wheelbarrow might charge i2>^ cents for taking a 
load half a mile, and 25 cents for more than half a 
mile and less than a mile. For a load carried by hand- 
barrow the charge was nearly twice as much, and by 
handcart 18 cents for half a mile and 31 cents up to a 
mile. By cart and horse the charge was i2j^ cents 
for taking a bale of cotton, barrel of oil or potash, box 
of Havana sugar, or 100 feet of lumber a distance less 
than two miles, and one-third more for every addi- 
tional half-mile. For the same distance 3 1 cents was 
the charge for a hogshead of beer or molasses contain- 
ing 60 to 90 gallons; 37^^ cents for a load of bricks 
or earthware over 1,000 pounds in weight, or a pipe 

99 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

of brandy; 50 cents for a load of furniture; $1.00 for 
a load of loose hay; $5 for every cable whole shot 
above 15 inches in circumference. Hacking coaches 
and carriages could charge, for less than a mile, 25 
cents per passenger, and 50 cents for any distance 
within the lamp-and-watch district above a mile; for 
conveying one or more passengers on a tour, $1 or 
$2.50; to Kingsbridge and back, keeping the carriage 
all day, $5. 

There was no specialization in the trades. The ap- 
prentice system prevailed, and the boy who was 
bound out learned everything about the trade — in 
shoemaking, for example, from the tanning of the 
leather to finishing the shoe. The apprentice lived 
with his employer, ate at his table, slept under^^ 
roof, and was subject to his discipline outside of^ie 
workshop as well as in it. 

Generally speaking^^*wages were high anjjhere 
was a brisk demand f^^orkmen. As industries were 
localized, there was a considerable variation in the 
wages in the different sections. In Massachusetts, 
where the pay was good, horseshoers received 90 
cents a day and found themselves, or 45 cents with 
board and lodging; ship carpenters, $1.25 a day, 
boarding themselves; common laborers from 50 cents 
to $1.50. In the South much of the labor was per- 
formed by negroes hired out by their owners, and the 
wages were about $6 a month with board. Boat- 
hands on the Mississippi were paid as much as $1 a 
day with board; laborers on the public roads $1 to 
$1.25 a day, with board. The board always included 
a daily allowance of whisk}'' or rum. Much of the 

100 



COMMON PEOPLE 

skilled labor in Pennsylvania was performed by re- 
demptioners, the wages going to those who had been 
at the charge of bringing the workmen from Eu- 
rope. There was competition to get workmen for 
extensive city improvements, and a city government 
often advertised for laborers in the newspapers of 
other cities. Working on the streets were many Irish 
immigrants. 

The chief element among the immigrants was Irish, 
but the great tide of immigration had not begun, the 
number admitted each year averaging 5,000. The 
inducements that the country offered were becoming 
known to the working classes of Europe, however. 
Guides for immigrants were being issued, telling of 
^|fcditions in America, the wages offered and the cost 
o^iving. The wages were fully double those paid 
in England and four times ^much as those paid in 
FranW, and the working-rn"^^mas under none of the 
compulsions to work and p^^axes which harassed 
him in European countries. He was free to work for 
any employer he chose, and to travel. If he had no 
property he paid no direct taxes. The cost of living 
was much less than in Europe, bread being one-third 
less than in any part of England, and beef, mutton, 
pork, and poultry one-half the price that prevailed 
in London. The same proportions maintained in 
groceries, and house rent and fuel even near New 
York were as low as they were in any part of Europe. 
Fruit cost one-tenth as much as it did in England; 
beer, wine, spirits, ftunitiu-e, and even farm imple- 
ments were cheaper. Some of the city governments 
fixed the price and standard of bread. In New York 

lOI 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

it was i2>^ cents for a full loaf weighing at least 
38 2-53 ounces, and 6% cents for a half -loaf. If a 
man chose to board he could find a good boarding- 
house for less than two dollars a week. 

The few people who employed household servants 
complained that it was hard to get them and that 
they were inefficient; and well-to-do foreigners 
thought it a hardship that they must not call them 
servants, but "help." They found them untrained, 
disrespectful, and disobedient. If they brought their 
servants with them they left their service almost im- 
mediately for more independent employment. Such 
household servants as there were were Irish immi- 
grants, a few were farmers' daughters for whom it 
was a temporary employment only, many were Jg^ 
negroes, and some were redemptioners. In the South 
the servants were slaves, except a few white house- 
keepers, and here thete was less complaint by em- 
ployers and the suppl}- was plentiful. Those in the 
South who did not own slaves hired the slaves of 
others as servants, and paid them less than the white 
servants received at the North. There the best women 
servants received about fifty dollars a year. The 
household of a well-to-do resident of Washington 
might comprise a white housekeeper, who was also 
a seamstress and made part of the clothing even for 
the man of the house, besides doing the clear starch- 
ing and ironing, a colored cook, a waitress, and a cham- 
bermaid. The charge of insubordination was not made 
against servants alone, but against all members of the 
working class. They had abolished the word * ' master " 
and held themselves to be the equals of their employers. 

102 



COMMON PEOPLE 

The hired laborer on the farm did not constitute 
a class. He might be a young man filling in an inter- 
val before he should have a farm of his own, or perhaps 
a thriftless fellow deficient in enterprise who chose 
to live from hand to mouth and stay in one neigh- 
borhood. How an energetic and thrifty man could 
rise can be shown from a typical case. The man was 
thirty years old, married, and had three children. 
His father gave him $500 to begin the world with 
and he went to Ohio. He took a cargo of flour down 
the river to New Orleans and sold it, thereby increas- 
ing his capital to $900. Then he bought a farm of 
250 acres of land, 65 acres being cleared, for $3,500. 
In a few years it Was paid for and he was worth $7,000. 
The farm laborer received wages of from $8 per month 
in winter to $10 in summer, with board and lodging, 
living in the farmer's famity and eating at his table. 
In the West the wages were higher. The hoiu-s of 
work were from sunrise to sunset. Usually the farmer 
and his family did all the work themselves, the boys 
going into the field as soon as they were strong enough, 
and the girls helping their mother in the house and 
the dairy. The household employments included 
spinning, weaving, knitting and sewing, making but- 
ter and cheese, stuffing sausages, salting meat, and 
preserving. 

Entertainment was not wanting for them, and it 
often combined work and pleasure. There were quilt- 
ing-parties, or "quiltings," as they were commonly 
called. ' ' She was invited, ' ' says a farmer, * ' to Tabitha 
Twist's quilting, and my girls were left out of the list." 
Husking-bees and similar parties lightened the routine 

103 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

of life. The men liked rough sports, and in some parts 
of the country fought in a ring, with spectators, like 
prize-fighters. They attended horse-races and raced 
their own horses. They cultivated the trotting-horse 
and raced him under the saddle. They amused them- 
selves with cock-fighting. They were good shots with 
the rifle and shotgun, and hunted a great deal. The 
boys were taught to shoot at an early age. They 
hunted foxes with hounds, following on foot or horse- 
back. There were bowling-greens in many of the 
villages. They played cards and checkers and bought 
lottery tickets. Indulgence in strong drink was the 
curse of every class and every section, but the greatest 
curse to the working class. There was a coarse song 
in vogue among them, called "Nothing Like Grog," 
which shows the degradation of the tipplers. One 
verse of it will suffice: 

My father, when last I from Guinea 

Returned with abundance of wealth, 
Cried, "Jack, never be such a ninny 

To drink." Says I," Father, your health." 
So I passed round the stuff; soon he twigg'd it, 

And it set the old codger agog, 
And he swigg'd, and mother and sister and brother 
And I swigg'd, and all of us swigg'd 

And swore there was nothing like grog. 

The temperate men who would not drink rum or 
whisky drank cider. The women were sober, but many 
of them used snuff. 

In every farm-house there was sure to be a Bible, 
bought usually from a peddler, and he purveyed 
lighter literature also, but the people who read seldom 
went much beyond the Bible and a few religious works. 

104 



COMMON PEOPLE 

All day they were too busy to read, and at night a 
tallow candle was not a good light for reading, so the 
story-teller came naturally into being to beguile the 
evening hours. Religion furnished them with mental 
excitement, and it was complained that when a re- 
vival was in progress the women neglected their 
household duties to attend the meetings. Strolling 
preachers came often and were regarded as a greater 
nuisance even than the peddlers. Quack doctors, 
too, robbed the credulous. "Here comes the famous 
Doctor Dolt," says the Farmer's Almanac, "with his 
skimk's grease and liverwort. A larnt man is the 
Doctor. Once he was a simple knight of the laps tone 
and pegging awl; but now he is blazoned on the first 
order of quack heraldry." . 

The people were normally superstitious. They be- 
lieved in miraculous cures. In 1813 a man appeared 
in Vermont, who declared he could cure all diseases 
by prayer. Patients flocked to him by the thousands 
and his letters accumulated by the bushel. It was a 
common thing to dig for treasure, the hiding-place 
having been revealed to some one in a dream. As 
many people were prejudiced against banks, and as 
banks were, moreover, not accessible to all who saved 
money, much of it was hidden, a favorite hiding-place 
being a hole in the ground. A magic hazel wand was 
often used to locate an abandoned hoard. One who was 
bom "with a veil over his face," as they termed it, 
or a caul, had supernatural gifts, and was apt to carry 
a talisman in the form of a small stone which did not 
differ in appearance from other pebbles, but enabled 
him to find anything. As the digging under super- 

105 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

natural direction never revealed anything, it confirmed 
the belief of the diggers in the devil, because he alone 
could have run off with the gold. 

There should have been enough for good doctors 
to do, for salt meat, heavy pastry, and fiery rum made 
dyspepsia common, and cold houses produced rheu- 
matism, and in the swampy regions the malaria- 
communicating mosquito flourished. The diet was 
not, however, altogether bad on the farms. Most of 
them had a "sarse" patch where vegetables were 
grown, and there was abundance of milk, butter, and 
cheese. The mainstay of the family, however, was 
the pork-barrel, but beef was also used a great deal. 
A good dinner consisted of boiled pork and potatoes, 
or salt beef, turnips, and stewed pumpkins. 

The advice which the people gave one another 
shows what they considered to be their every-day 
evils and virtues. Scolding, back-biting women, and 
lazy, tipsy husbands were inveighed against, and the 
husband who did not help his wife received unmeas- 
ured censure. "A large woodpile is one sign of a good 
husband," they said. Profanity was a vile practice 
which should be stamped out. Above all things, the 
children of the family must be educated, the schools, 
the mentors insisted, being the safeguard of the coun- 
try. Direct charity was the duty of all. Thus, a 
farmer is represented as being about to buy a lottery 
ticket, when a neighbor advises him not to throw his 
money away, and he changes his mind. He calls his 
son, "Here, Tom, take this five-dollar bill to the Widow 
Lonesome; tell her it is at her disposal; then hasten back 
to your school. I will to mv team and my wood-lot." 



XIII 

THE SUNSHINE OF HUMOR 

THE sense of humor of a nation rises from the 
common people. It rests upon pecuHarities and 
contrasts in characters and dispositions, producing 
strange remarks and situations which appear to be 
ludicrous to people of all classes. A touch of real 
humor makes all men kin, and a joke is a joke to 
the scholar as well as the clown. Foreigners usually- 
found the Americans a solemn people, and merry 
they certainly were not; but they were developing 
a sense of humor so peculiarly their own that few 
foreigners understood it. Unfortunately, the record 
of it is meager, for the weight of English literary tra- 
ditions hung so heavily upon the writers that, when 
they wished to be ftmny they tried to write like Eng- 
lish humorists. 

The fragmentary record is sufficient, however, to 
enable us to form a reasonably definite idea of what 
the people laughed at. Of course, many of the jokes 
were vulgar, as jokes at that period were everywhere. 
Many that were printed no publisher would now dare 
to put in the post-office. Respectable men roared 
over stories which the women were not permitted to 
hear, and they told stories before the women which 
made them laugh and blush at the same time. The 

107 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

head of the nation was one of these humorists. To 
the ladies of his acquaintance he made what they 
called "mischievous remarks," and in a social circle 
of men he produced uproarious mirth by jests which 
were often very broad. I have found some examples 
of his humor which could be quoted and others which 
I cannot quote. He was open to the charge of oc- 
casionally making a pun, but many of his contempo- 
raries were worse offenders in this particular than he 
was. The wits of Philadelphia were having a debauch 
of puns, which even invaded the cultured circle of 
Dr. Wistar's parties. 

Among the characters whom the people laughed at 
was the Dutchman of New York, with his large, square 
figure, great breadth of beam, and enormous coat and 
trousers made from an ancient pattern which no one 
but himself had ever used. He spoke English with 
an accent of his own, his nature was stolid and phleg- 
matic, and he adhered to the old way of doing things 
in a land where every one was regarded as ridiculous 
who did not grasp at novelties and inventions. Then 
there was the Pennsylvania Quaker, sanctimonious 
and solemn, of measured speech, "theeing" and 
"thouing" like a personified page from the Bible, 
who often gave pleasant astonishment by exhibiting 
worldly wisdom and effective repartee which were 
quite out of keeping with his joyless visage. The 
Irishman was a stock humorous character, amusing 
because of his brogue, his sentimental, unworldly 
nature, his reckless conduct, and his indifference to 
rules of logic, but he was not peculiarly an American 
possession. The two chief humorous figures who 

io8 



THE SUNSHINE OF HUMOR 

were our very own were the Yankee philosopher and 
trader and the negro. 

The humorous Yankee was depicted as long-legged, 
sharp-visaged, blue-eyed, sandy-haired, with a long 
nose through which he talked, wearing garments al- 
ways a little too small for him, which displayed his 
long bony hands and wrists and large feet and ankles. 
His manner was dry and serious, his powers of ob- 
servation and penetration were extraordinary, and he 
expressed himself in original language. Often he was 
depicted as lazy and shiftless, being in this respect 
unlike his neighbors. He hung about in the villages 
and did odd jobs, told amazing stories and discussed 
theological subjects. This type was not as widely 
known as the Yankee trader, however, whose unscru- 
pulous cleverness in over-reaching every one with 
whom he drove a bargain fiurnished a rich fund from 
which innumerable anecdotes were drawn. Already 
the story of the consignment of nutmegs made of 
walnut wood, which had been sent out from Con- 
necticut, was national property. 

Much of the sale of household and personal super- 
fluities was by direct application of the vender, and 
to make a sale he must arouse a desire on the part 
of the piurchaser to purchase his articles. He took 
a long joiu-ney to reach his customers, who lived far 
apart, and to compensate himself for the time con- 
sumed he placed the price of his goods at an im- 
measurable distance from the original cost. To be 
successful he must be sharp of wit, glib of speech, 
and active in his imagination, so he tried to create 
the good-nature and accommodating spirit which 

109 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

come to one who has been well deceived. By a knowl- 
edge of "soft sawder" and "human natur'" he com- 
pelled women, and men, too, to buy. He was both 
a diplomat and an orator. Thus, a clock-seller comes 
to a farm-house. 

"Just to say good-by, Mrs. Flint," he says to the 
wife. 

"What," says she, "have you sold all your clocks?" 

"Yes, and very low, too, for money is scarce and 
I wish to close the consam. No, I am wrong in saying 
all, for I have just one left. Neighbor Steel's wife 
asked to have the refusal of it; but I guess I won't 
sell it. I had but two of them — this one and the 
feller of it, that I sold Governor Lincoln. General 
Green, the Secretary of State of Maine, said he'd 
give me fifty dollars for this one, but I guess I'll take 
it back"; and so on, till the woman's sense of rivalry 
and curiosity is so aroused that she is determined to 
have the clock. After much persuasion he produces 
it and places it on the chimneypiece. The husband 
comes in and admires it, but he has a watch and does 
not think he needs a clock. 

"I guess you're in the wrong furrow this time, 
Deacon," says the clock-seller. "It ain't for sale, 
and if it was I reckon neighbor Steel's wife would 
have it, for she gave me no peace about it." He looks 
at his watch. "Why, it ain't possible! As I'm alive, 
it is four o'clock, and if I haven't been two hours here! 
I tell you what, Mrs. Flint, I'll leave the clock in 
your care till I return." 

So he winds it up and gives the key to the Deacon, 
telling Mrs. Flint to remind her husband to wind it 



THE SUNSHINE OF HUMOR 

every Saturday night. As he rides away he remarks 
to a companion: 

"That I call human natur'. Now that clock is 
sold for forty dollars; it cost me just six dollars and 
fifty cents. Mrs. Flint will never let Mrs. Steel have 
the refusal, nor will the Deacon learn, till I call for 
the clock, that, having once indulged in the use of a 
superfluity, how difficult it is to give it up. We 
can do without any article of luxury we have never 
had, but when once obtained it is not in human natur* 
to surrender it voluntarily. We trust to 'soft sawder' 
to get them into the house, and to human natur' that 
they never come out of it." 

The Yankee was put on the stage almost as soon 
as an American drama was written, and has done ser- 
vice in caricature on every stage in the land. He was 
not as well known in the South as in the North, but 
he appeared there among the coimtry people occa- 
sionally, and always left a reputation behind him. 

The negro was a Southern product, but he furnished 
humor for the whole country. Wherever he was he 
was laughed at. Those communities at the North 
which had only a few of them laughed at the few, and 
they had a monopoly of the humor of the South. 
They were the only really merry people in America. 
There were many reasons for it. They were by nature 
irresponsible, and in slavery they had no responsi- 
bility at all. For them it was to eat and be merry; 
their to-morrow was the care of others. Perhaps, too, 
the sadness of their hopeless bondage caused them to 
seek forgetfulness of their condition in the mirth of 
the moment. Like many humorists, they went quickly 

III 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

from laughter to tears. Until recently they had lived 
in an infant state of society, in the artless age when 
human nature shoots "wild and free"; when civili- 
zation has not cramped the exercise of the fancy and 
passion. Wonder and surprise were more easily ex- 
cited in them than they were in a sophisticated people. 
They were still close to the time when they had spoken 
and acted in the "uncovered simplicity" of nature. 
They lived in a world of imagination and passion and 
were indifferent to truth and precision. They were 
rude poets as well as humorists. They personified do- 
mestic and wild animals and made them talk. The 
stories of Uncle Remus are all more than a century 
old. Themselves childlike in nature, they had a men- 
tal community with the white children and told them 
stories of talking rabbits, bears, and foxes, and of the 
strange doings of the creatures of the unseen world, 
which the children repeated to their parents, and thus 
the folk-lore was communicated by the little ones. 
They luxuriated in superstition, and had a hundred 
ghosts, ha'nts, charms, fetishes, and voodoos to the 
white man's one. Their emotions found expression in 
dancing and singing and in loud oratory. The more 
eloquent among them were preachers, and thundered 
forth discourses of amazing length which disclosed 
ludicrous notions of the personal interposition of 
Providence in human affairs. They pronounced Eng- 
lish words in a way which was all their own, and they 
were gifted with an interminable flow of language. 
The negro's appearance was grotesque and he looked 
like a great, good-natured monkey. His sable skin, 
woolly hair, and enormous mouth brought laughter 

112 



THE SUNSHINE OF HUMOR 

from all who beheld him. He imitated his white mas- 
ter with delightful exaggeration. If the master's man- 
ners were courtly the man's were majestic; if the 
former was dignified the latter was an embodiment of 
pomposity. When he heard long words he adopted 
them, adding some syllables to make them longer. 
If the tall collar was the vogue he wore one that cov- 
ered his ears; if long coats were in fashion he wore 
tails that touched his heels. Like the humorous 
Yankee, he, too, was required by the people to be 
represented on the stage at an early period, and so 
popular was he that later he furnished material for 
a full theatrical show under the title of the negro 
minstrels. ' ' Tambo ' ' and * ' Bones, ' ' the two end men, 
making music by rattling bones and beating a tam- 
bourine, bandying jests and quirks, and the pompous 
interlocutor, usually addressed as "Governor" or 
"General," were fair exaggerations of negro characters 
that might be met with anywhere. 



XIV 

"religion, or the duty we owe to our creator" 

"AS the government of the United States is not 
2\ in any sense founded on the Christian rehgion," 
were the words with which one of the articles in the 
treaty between the United States and TripoH, signed 
in 1796, began. Washington was the President at 
the time, Timothy Pickering, of Massachusetts, the 
Secretary of State, and Joel Barlow, of Connecticut, 
the agent who negotiated the treaty. It was agreed 
to by the Senate without objection, so far as history 
records. During Washington's administration he is- 
sued two proclamations, being recommended to do 
so by Congress, calling upon the people to give thanks 
to God for their blessings and to pray for remission 
of their sins. In the first one, dated October 3, 1789, 
seven months after the new government had been in 
operation, he enumerated the "civil and religious 
liberty" which the people enjoyed as one cause for 
thanks, and advised them to supplicate "that great 
and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of 
all the good that was, that is, or that will be." In 
the second proclamation, January i, 1795, drafted by 
Alexander Hamilton, he advised that thanks be given 
to "the Great Ruler of Nations." He purposely 
worded both proclamations so that they would be 

114 



''RELIGION" 

acceptable to all who believed in a God. John Adams 
was not so generous. His proclamation of March 23, 
1798, appointing a day of public fasting, humiliation, 
and prayer, recommended the people to implore the 
mercy of God "through the Redeemer of the World," 
and he repeated the recognition of the Saviour in 
another proclamation a year later. Jefferson issued no 
proclamation of the character we are discussing, but 
Madison was called upon by Congress to issue one 
of thanks for the peace with England; and, although 
he was urged by many people to make it a Christian 
document, he followed Washington's example, and 
worded it so that a non-Christian could accept it. 
After his retirement from office he expressed the 
opinion that Congress had erred in employing at pub- 
lic expense chaplains to open the sittings with prayer. 
He said the chaplains must be members of some re- 
ligious sect which was obnoxious to Catholics and 
Quakers, of whom there were always a few in Congress. 
The event proved that he misjudged, however, for 
in 1832 Charles Constantine Pise, a Catholic priest, 
was chosen to be chaplain of the Senate. 

But there was really no connection between the 
national government and religion, complete separa- 
tion having been required by the fundamental law. 
Because he believed them to be an encroachment 
upon the spirit of that law, the President vetoed two 
bills in 181 1, one to incorporate an Episcopal Church 
in Alexandria, then a part of the District of Columbia, 
the other reserving a piece of public land in Mississippi 
Territory for a Baptist church. 

It must not be supposed, however, that the separ- 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

ation of church and state meant that the people and 
their leaders were irreligious. On the contrary, some, 
at least, of the leaders in the cause of religious freedom 
intended the separation to be an exaltation of re- 
ligion into a thing above and beyond the reach of 
government. This was the President's position. The 
Virginia Bill of Rights, which may be said to have been 
the pioneer declaration on the subject, had said : 

That religion or the duty we owe to our Creator, and the 
manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and con- 
viction, not by force or violence, and therefore all men are equally 
entitled to the free exercise of rehgion according to the dictates 
of conscience. 

This clause was phrased so as to avoid the use of the 
word "toleration," and was the result of an amend- 
ment offered by Madison, when a very young man 
fresh from Princeton College, intensely religious and 
suspected of an intention of going into the ministry. 
The argument used for the clause was the same that 
Mirabeau advanced twenty years later: 

The most unlimited liberty of religion is in my eyes a right 
so sacred that to express it by the word "toleration" seems to 
me itself a sort of tyranny, since the authority which tolerates 
may also not tolerate. 

Furthermore, the fathers of the Republic believed 
that religion and morality were welded together, and 
that national virtue could not exist without religious 
faith. They were in full accord with Washington's 
declaration in the Farewell Address: 

Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined edu- 
cation on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience 
both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in 
exclusion of reUgious principles. 

ii6 



''RELIGION" 

In 1815 the United States was the only country 
in the world which did not have an official religion. 
Religious toleration was general throughout Europe; 
individuals could hold such views as they preferred 
and attend any or no church, but they did so by per- 
mission and not by right. 

When we examine this country in detail we find 
that not all the states were as liberal as the national 
government was. The conviction that virtue came 
from religion made many people think that the state 
must support the one to obtain the other. The Con- 
stitution of Massachusetts said: 

As the happiness of a people and the good order and preser- 
vation of civil government essentially depend upon piety, reli- 
gion, and morality, and as these cannot be generally diffused 
through a community but by the institution of the public worship 
of God and of public instruction in piety, religion, and morality — 

therefore the legislature must reqmre the people to 
make suitable provision for public worship and "the 
support of public Protestant teachers of piety, religion, 
and morality." New Hampshire said that morality 
and piety, "grounded on evangelical principles," were 
the best security to good government, and that to 
have them taught the legislature must see that pro- 
vision was made for "public Protestant teachers." 
Massachusetts and New Hampshire had, in effect, a 
Church establishment. So had Connecticut; and 
it made a constitution in 18 18 which proclaimed the 
right of freedom of worship, but allowed taxation 
for support of the churches. Vermont had an ex- 
pression in favor of revealed religion. The Maryland 
Declaration of Rights allowed the legislature "to lay 

117 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

a general and equal tax for the support of the Christian 
religion"; New Jersey said that "all persons pro- 
fessing a belief in the faith of any Protestant sect" 
should be eligible to office; North Carolina that no 
person who should "deny the being of God or the 
truth of the Protestant religion or the divine authority 
either of the Old or New Testament" should be capa- 
ble of holding any office or place of trust or profit 
in the civil department of the state. Rhode Island 
had religious freedom only for Christians. Tennessee 
said: "No person who denies the being of God, or 
a future state of rewards and punishment, shall hold 
any office in the civil department of this state." 
Pennsylvania put the atheists beyond the pale : "Nor 
can any man who acknowledges the being of a God 
be justly deprived or abridged of any civil right," etc. 
Complete freedom of conscience existed only in New 
York, Delaware, Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, and 
Louisiana. 

There were very few people who would have been 
affected injuriously by the discriminatory laws, even 
if they had been enforced, and they were not enforced. 
Belief in the divine origin of the Bible, in the miracu- 
lous creation of the world, in heaven and hell as places, 
in creationism, or that all living things, and especially 
man, were made substantially as they then existed, 
was well-nigh universal. Evolution, or the doctrine 
of derivation, was unknown. A few people still read 
the writings of the skeptics — of Voltaire and others 
of the French school, of Hume, of Kant; but the one 
most read was Tom Paine. The Age of Reason came 
to America by way of Paris, however, and was one 

ii8 



"RELIGION" 

of the products of the French Revolution, so its in- 
fluence declined as the people became disillusionized 
with respect to that upheaval. The basis of Paine's 
attack on Christianity was its improbability, the 
similarity to pagan mythology, and the inconclusive 
proof of it; and this was the basis of attack by the 
other writers. Orthodoxy was as yet assailed only 
by philosophy, ridicule, and logic; it had received 
no serious wounds from scientific discoveries. That 
the earth was not the center of the universe was 
known; but geology had not yet revealed its slow 
formation. Darwin and his theories did not come 
till fifty years later. 

Yet immediately after the Revolution there had 
been much infidelity in the country. Seven years of 
war had impoverished the churches and a great many 
of them had been destroyed. The Episcopal Church, 
the oldest and the strongest before the Revolution, 
was almost wiped out of existence by the war. Two- 
thirds of the clergymen were loyalists and had fled. 
It had been the state Church and fell to pieces when 
state support was withdrawn. The budding Methodist 
Church had depended for existence on John Wesley, 
an Englishman, who opposed the patriot cause, and 
many of the ministers had returned to British juris- 
diction. The other churches might more easily adjust 
themselves to changed conditions, but before the re- 
adjustment came the wave of infidelity swept over 
the land. It came from France as a part of the affec- 
tation of French things and opinions which resulted 
from the alliance, and from the French Revolution, 
which Americans thought was an imitation of their 

119 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

own. But the French influence was artificial and soon 
passed; with it went the infideHty, and reHgion was 
enthroned again. 

America was naturally its kingdom and the Amer- 
icans were naturally its subjects. They came of re- 
ligious stock. Back of many of them was the fact, 
in which they took great pride, that their fathers had 
settled in the land for religious reasons. While they 
were not, when compared with Latins, an emotional 
people, they were, nevertheless, strongly sentimen- 
tal. Everybody who could read read poetry. It 
was a necessary mode of expression to them. They 
were dwellers in the country surrounded by phenom- 
ena of nature which they could not explain by nat- 
ural causes. Scholars cultivating their intellects and 
killing their natural craving for religion were few and 
had little influence. 

Religion came to its own through a series of re- 
vivals, close following upon one another and extend- 
ing over the whole country. They began in Vir- 
ginia in 1785, and lasted six or seven years in that 
state and the neighboring states. They appeared 
in New England in 1791 and became a characteristic 
feature of Congregational life. What was known as 
"The Great Revival" began in 1801 on the frontier 
in Kentucky, and swept northward, carrying thou- 
sands of people into the churches. The revival meet- 
ings were so large that no building could hold the 
people, so they gathered in the open. Often a meeting 
lasted several days and they camped out, so the meet- 
ings became "camp meetings." All the Protestant 
churches profited by the revivals, but the Methodists 

120 



"RELIGION" 

and Baptists profited the most, and then began their 
great career as popular churches. The Methodist 
travehng preachers reached the residents of remote 
districts. The vigorous style of preaching which they 
practised, and the fact that they were not usually 
better dressed or better educated than the average 
people in their audiences, made them popular with 
the masses, and the membership grew rapidly. From 
the time that the first Methodist preaching-house was 
erected there had been negroes in the Church, and in 
1 80 1 Zion Church, the first church exclusively for col- 
ored people, was erected in New York. By 18 15 it 
was the most popular sect with them, dividing only 
with the Baptists. 

That sect had already risen to a large membership. 
Starting in Rhode Island, it had gone through the 
Middle States and found a rich field in the South when 
the Episcopal Church was in a state of depression. 
It was the Church of the missionary and pioneer and 
went West with the earliest settlements. In 1812 it 
claimed a membership of nearly 18,000 in New York, 
of 35,000 in Virginia, of 13,000 in North Carolina, 
and about as many in South Carolina and Georgia, 
of 10,000 in Tennessee, and 17,000 in Kentucky. 
Probably it was the most populous sect in the whole 
country. 

The Episcopal Church after a painful effort at re- 
suscitation had at length established an American 
system of government, and in 18 14 had a notable 
infusion of energy. New bishops were consecrated, 
many clergymen were ordained, old churches, long 
abandoned, were reopened, and the Church, as it 

J2I 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

stands to-day was put upon its feet. Outside of New 
England it was the Church of the intellectual and the 
well-bom. 

The Presbyterians had not suffered from English 
affiliations as the Episcopalians and Methodists had, 
but they derived fewer accessions from the Great Re- 
vival than the Baptists and Methodists did. They 
discouraged the hysterical, violent methods which 
characterized many revival meetings, and their cler- 
gymen were usually men of liberal education and 
not in complete sympathy with an ignorant crowd. 
Nevertheless, the Chiirch had a normal growth and 
by 1815 numbered at least 30,000 members. Wher- 
ever the inhabitants were of Scotch-Irish origin there 
were Presbyterians. 

The great Catholic denomination, now the largest 
of all, was then hardly as large as the Presbyterian. It 
had begun actively as an American institution in 1790 
under the bishopric of John Carroll, and when he died 
in 1815 there were Catholic schools, convents, and col- 
leges, a Catholic press, and at least one himdred priests. 

The impulse to its progress came from a patriotic 
American, a member of a family noted for its service 
to the state. It was in religion as it was in every 
other institution — it progressed only when it joined the 
ranks that were marching on to the new nationality. 

The preponderating Church in New England was 
the Congregational, and as it differed from the Pres- 
byterian only in the matter of Church government, 
the two often acted together. Already Unitarianism 
had arisen in the Congregational Church in Boston 
and the battle between them was raging; but the 

122 



"RELIGION';' 

separation had not yet been effected and the Uni- 
tarians outside of Boston were very few. 

The Jews were a mere handful, probably not 5,000 
in the whole country, grouped in several seaboard 
cities — Newport, New York, Charleston, Savannah, 
New Orleans, and Philadelphia, 

Taking the religions geographically, the popula- 
tion of New England was overwhelmingly Congre- 
gational; in New York were many members of the 
Dutch Reformed Chiu-ch and Episcopalians ; in Penn- 
sylvania and New Jersey, Lutherans, Quakers, Mora- 
vians, and Episcopalians ; in the Middle States and the 
South, Baptists, Methodists, and Episcopalians ; in the 
West, Methodists and Baptists. In Maryland were many 
Catholics, and they had a preponderance in Louisiana. 

The prevalence of religion was general. It is true 
that the Indians were slow to yield to the Christian 
missionaries, having, in fact, a religion of their own, 
with a beUef in a Supreme Being and a future state; 
but the negroes were all Christians. 

They had been brought to America with the re- 
ligion of their race, were worshipers of idols and 
fetishes, believers in charms and witchcraft; but 
under the white masters' orders they discarded their 
idols and knelt at the same altar with their masters. 
They never gave up their belief in charms and witches ; 
but they became Christians almost as soon as they 
touched Christian shores. 

All of the various sects in the country held it to 
be their mission to educate youth for admission to 
the ministry, and from this conviction came the col- 
leges of the coimtry. 

123 



XV 

Webster's speller 

ANEW country, the population scattered over 
a great expanse, engaged in the work of con- 
quering nature, working, under a popular government, 
steadily toward the glorification of the common man, 
is not the place where one should expect to find full 
cultivation of the higher intellectual qualities. The 
necessities are encouraging to action and antagonistic 
to study. Benjamin Franklin said it in the Pennsyl- 
vania Gazette, August 24, 1749, when he urged higher 
education upon the colony of Pennsylvania: 

In the settling of new countries the first care of the planters 
must be to provide and secure the necessaries of life; this en- 
grosses their attention and affords them little time to think of 
anything farther. . . . Agriculture and mechanic arts were of the 
most immediate importance; the culture of minds by the finer 
arts and sciences was necessarily postponed to times of more 
wealth and leisure. 

The ideals of the people formed accordingly. They 
were in the fighting stage, and their greatest admir- 
ation was for fighting men. There was a man rising 
in the new Southwest who realized their ideals. 

They had demanded that the war should produce a 
hero who should overtop all others, and they made 
one out of Andrew Jackson, a man who undoubtedly 

124 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

had many heroic qualities. Popular at the close of 
the war, his popularity grew steadily and became 
overwhelming. The common people admired him 
and chose him for their champion, and he was a man 
to be admired. His intellect was strong, even though 
it was narrow and uncultivated; he was of perfect 
integrity, of glowing patriotism, and of chivalrous 
nature. He was deep in prejudices, but he was ab- 
solutely free from class prejudice. Prince and pauper, 
learned man and ignorant, were all equal in his eyes. 
Philanthropy and courage shone out from his presence, 
and wherever he went men turned to look at him and 
felt that he was not an ordinary man. In fact, the 
people's champion was a true knight, even though 
he wielded a fence rail instead of a shining lance, 
and the deadly twenty paces of a sylvan retreat took 
the place of the crowded lists. His Rowena, who sat 
trembling at home, waiting to know the chance re- 
sult of a pistol-shot, was a faded woman of the fron- 
tier, who could quote no poetry beyond a few Metho- 
dist hymns; yet more romance had been crowded 
into her life than any of Sir Walter's heroines ever 
knew. Alas! the Waverley novels were coming out 
at this very time and she never read a line of them. 
Andrew Jackson was not a well-educated man and 
his wife was hardly educated at all. He had been to 
an "old field" school in North Carolina for a few 
years — a rough institution where the rudiments were 
taught by an ignorant teacher. He learned to express 
himself well, but he spelled as he chose and his gram- 
mar was bad. Of science, the classics, literature, he 
knew nothing. Here was the man who represented 

125 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the new order; here was the man who was the ex- 
ponent of the masses of the people and whom they 
loved as they have loved no other President. Through 
him they took over the government which up to this 
time they had intrusted to gentlemen and scholars. 
With praiseworthy self-restraint they allowed the old 
order to pass without violent expulsion. In 1815 the 
profoundest scholar of government in America was 
the President. He had succeeded a man of whom it 
is hardly an exaggeration to say, as Ferdinand Lassalle 
once said of himself, that he was armed with all the 
culture of his century. Madison's successor was a 
graduate of William and Mary College, and Monroe's 
successor had studied in Paris and Holland before 
he graduated from Harvard. The choice of these men 
for the Presidency showed how forceful was the habit 
which had come from England, of conferring high 
public offices upon college-bred men. It was inevi- 
table, however, that it should give way before the 
growing consciousness of power of a people whose 
surroundings were not of a kind to make the scholar 
their favorite type. 

Nevertheless, there had been an earnest effort from 
the earliest settlement of the country to establish in- 
stitutions of higher education. It had been fostered 
here, as it has been fostered from the earliest times 
in all lands, by religion, by government, and by pri- 
vate philanthropy ; and the educational system went, 
as it has always done, from the top downward. There 
were colleges before there were academies, and acad- 
emies before there were common schools, and the 
Church, the state and the rich man gave their at- 

126 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

tention to the first before they gave it to the 
last. 

In 1638 John Harvard, a rich Congregational min- 
ister, left £800 to the newly established state college at 
Cambridge, and it was given his name. In 1691 Com- 
missary James Blair asked Queen Mary for a charter 
for a college in Virginia where young men could be 
prepared for the ministry, and subscriptions were suc- 
cessfully solicited from rich and influential persons. 
The college was erected near the Episcopal church 
at Williamsburg and became the College of William 
and Mary. When the state of Virginia gave George 
Washington certain shares in the James River and 
Potomac River companies, he transferred part of 
them to the Washington Academy (now the Wash- 
ington and Lee University) at Lexington, Virginia, 
and left the rest in trust for the benefit of a national 
university when it should be established. He never 
seems to have thought of giving the stock to en- 
courage popular education. Thomas Jefferson, after 
much study of the schools of Europe, thought out 
the most scientific and far-reaching scheme of state 
education that had thus far been elaborated in 
America. The capstone of the structure was to be 
the university. He enlarged the Albemarle Acad- 
emy into Central College in 18 16, and it became the 
University of Virginia in 18 19, but he had been dead 
for forty years before the state established a common- 
school system. It is true that there were many com- 
mon schools in the country from the earliest times, but 
the main interest was in the higher institutions. 

Harvard had recently become a Unitarian College; 

127 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Yale, founded in 1699, and Dartmouth, founded in 
1769, were Congregational. Col. Ephraim Williams 
made a bequest for educational purposes in 1755, and 
with the aid of the state Williams College was estab- 
lished at Williamstown, Massachusetts, in 1793. It 
was not an ecclesiastical college, but it soon became 
a breeding-place for missionaries of the Congrega- 
tional Church. King's College, afterward Columbia, 
in New York, and the University of Pennsylvania 
received royal charters in 1754, and were, of course, 
imder the control of the Episcopal Church. In South 
Carolina the state established a college at Columbia 
which opened its doors in 1805. It was not sectarian, 
but the president was an Episcopal clergyman. The 
Presbyterians had the College of New Jersey at Prince- 
ton. It was powerful in the Middle States, was the 
parent of higher education in North Carolina, and the 
several Presbyterian colleges in Virginia owed their 
beginning to Princeton men. The Baptists had 
founded Brown University at Providence, Rhode 
Island, in 1764. The Catholics had several good 
academies, and the college at Georgetown had been 
opened in 1791. Naturally, the last sect to make an 
effort in the direction of higher education was the 
most popular with the [common people, and it was 
not till 1829 that the Methodist Church founded 
Randolph-Macon College at Ashland in Virginia. It 
should be remarked, however, that while nearly all 
the colleges had their origin in the needs of the 
churches, they were not sectarian in their member- 
ship, and no student was barred from attending a 
college because he did not belong to the religious sect 

128 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

which controlled it. The form of organization of the 
colleges was copied from that of Cambridge Univer- 
sity, England. The prescribed course was four years. 
The degree conferred was Bachelor of Arts. When 
the University of Virginia was opened it provided for 
an elective course of study, and already some choice 
was allowed at William and Mary; but in the other 
colleges all the scholars followed the same course. 
This included Latin, Greek, English literature, and 
rhetoric, mathematics, physics, chemistry, a little 
logic, psychology and metaphysics, political economy, 
a little history, and sometimes a smattering of German 
and French. In none of these studies was the coiirse 
an advanced one, except in Latin and Greek. Boys 
entered college at fifteen or sixteen years of age, the 
average graduating age being twenty. There were 
no graduates' schools; but at the larger colleges it 
was common to find a few students who remained 
after graduation for a year's extra study of some 
special subject. After all, only a small proportion 
of the people goes to college, and it was a very small 
proportion in 1815. In that year 23 students grad- 
uated from Williams, 66 from Harvard, 69 from 
Yale, 40 from Princeton, 15 from the University of 
Pennsylvania, and 37 from the University of South 
Carolina. 

Of professional schools there were few, and youths 
who wished to become clergymen, lawyers, or physi- 
cians studied under older members of these professions. 
There were a few divinity schools, however — one for 
the Dutch Reformed Church at New York, estab- 
lished in 1784, which was the oldest; St. Mary's 
9 129 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Academy at Baltimore for students for the Catholic 
priesthood, established in 1791 ; one for Presbyterians 
at Service, Pennsylvania (now at Chambersburg), es- 
tablished in 1794; the Andover Seminary at Andover, 
Massachusetts, established by the Congregationalists 
in 1778. The Princeton Theological Seminary began 
in 181 2. There was no Episcopal seminary until one 
was established at New York in 18 19, and none for 
the Baptists till that at Hamilton, New York, was 
opened in 181 7. Any student might become grounded 
in theology, however, at the colleges, where it was 
part of the course, where the Bible was taught and 
the New Testament read in Greek. 

The medical schools were multiplying. There had 
been one in Philadelphia since 1745, and in New York 
since 1750. The former became a part of the Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania in 1791; the latter the Medical 
Department of King's College in 1767 and the College 
of Physicians and Surgeons in 18 13. Harvard (1782), 
Dartmouth (1781), the University of Maryland at 
Baltimore (1807), Yale (18 13) — all had medical schools 
of good standing, that at Philadelphia being esteemed 
the best. Until 18 13 it was the custom to confer the 
degree of Bachelor of Medicine first, and after a year 
more of study the Doctor's degree. Commonly, the 
course comprised two sessions of four or five months 
each. Notwithstanding the increase in the members 
of schools, not one practising physician in ten had 
ever taken a degree, nearly all of them having been 
educated in medicine in doctors' offices. 

The young lawyers, too, came through the offices 
of older lawyers. There was only one law-school, 

130 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

that of Tapping Reeve and Judge James Gould at 
Litchfield, Conn. In had developed from an increase 
in the number of law students in Reeve's office. The 
course was fifteen months. In 1817 the University 
of Pennsylvania and Harvard established law-schools. 
There were no technical schools except the Military 
Academy at West Point, which had been established 
in 1802. It was the only institution where engineering 
was taught. There was no Naval Academy till 1845. 
The boy who wanted to become a naval officer sailed 
on a merchantman or as a midshipman on a man-of- 
war. He entered upon his career when he was a mere 
child, sometimes when he was nine years old. 

To prepare for college many boys of the opulent 
class, especially in the South, received instruction 
from a family tutor — usually a young scholar who 
filled in a year or two after graduating from college 
by teaching before entering upon a profession. He 
was treated as a member of the family who employed 
him, and taught all the children who were old enough 
to leave the nursery. Frequently the parents taught 
their own children, however, and this was one of the 
causes of the strong family cohesion which was a 
characteristic of the time. 

The greater number of boys and girls who received 
any education beyond the elementary obtained it at 
the grammar-schools or academies, where the studies 
for boys were generally regulated by the requirements 
of the colleges. There were some 265 of these insti- 
tutions scattered through the country, and new ones 
were constantly springing up. A boy might enter 
when he was nine and remain four or five years. He 

131 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

underwent a classical course, usually with very little 
of science; but the academies differed greatly from 
one another in many respects, and reflected the in- 
dividual views of the principals, who were nearly al- 
ways the proprietors. Two illustrations will suffice to 
demonstrate this. Rev. Moses Waddell, a Presby- 
terian minister, had an academy at Willington, 
South CaroHna, near the Georgia border, which was 
probably the most famous school in that part of the 
country. The recitation-hall was a log cabin, and 
situated near it were smaller log cabins where the boys 
lived. Every morning Dr. Waddell would come to 
the door of the recitation-building and blow a horn, 
when the boys would gather for prayers. When they 
were not reciting they studied their lessons in groups 
out of doors under the trees. If the weather was cold 
they built fires and sat around them. Waddell suc- 
ceeded in exciting emulation among his scholars, and 
his graduates pronounced him an incomparable teach- 
er. His course was classical, and the discipline ap- 
pears to have been of the easiest. Of different char- 
acter was the "American Military, Scientific, and 
Literary Academy" which Captain Alden Partridge 
started at Norwich, Vermont, in 1820, whence he 
moved to Middletown, Connecticut, and then back 
to Norwich, where in 1835 his school became the Nor- 
wich University. He had well-planned buildings, and 
those at Middletown served for Wesleyan University 
when it began in 1831. The boys wore uniforms, mil- 
itary discipline was enforced, the cotuse was chiefly 
scientific and mathematical, and modem languages, 
especially French, were taught. He took his boys on 

132 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

long excursions to historic points, and once they went 
all the way to Washington by steamboat and on foot, 
and met President John Quincy Adams. The hours 
for meals, study, and recitation were those which 
prevailed in most academies. Breakfast was at seven 
o'clock in winter and a quarter before seven in sum- 
mer; dinner was at one; supper at sunset. Study 
and recitations began at eight in summer and nine 
in winter, and lasted till one; were resumed at two 
and ceased at four. From four to five there was 
recreation; from five till simset, study; and in the 
evening, study and private lectures till ten o'clock, 
when everybody must be in bed. The day began with 
prayer, and on Sunday each cadet must remain in his 
room, except when he was at divine service. The va- 
cation was for six weeks, beginning with the first 
Monday in December. The expense was about $275 
per annum for each boy, which was more than the 
cost at most academies. Some of the academies were 
endowed and some had state assistance, but very 
few were free. There were no high-schools till one 
at Boston was started in 1821. There were no co- 
educational academies. The Bradford Academy in 
the Merrimac Valley, founded in 1803, was intended 
for boys and girls, but after a short time it became a 
girls' school. The higher classes studied Morse's 
Geography, Murray's English Grammar, Pope's Essay 
on Man, Blair's Rhetoric, and the Bible — a course 
which it would be hard to improve upon. They were 
taught embroidering and other accomplishments with 
the needle. The movement for giving a girl the same 
education as a boy was about to begin, however. In 

133 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

1818 Rev. Joseph Emerson opened his Girls' Seminary 
at Byfield, Massachusetts, and taught such studies as 
boys learned. In 182 1 Emma Willard started her 
girls' seminary at Troy, which was on the same plan 
as a boys' academy. A college course for girls was, 
as yet, not thought of. In the South girls were usu- 
ally taught at home, by the mother or father or by 
the family tutor. Girls of poor parents might learn 
the rudiments at a village school taught by some 
poor woman, who received a pittance in retiun for 
imparting a pittance of knowledge, but even this 
apology for education was available to few. The 
prevalent idea was that it was not desirable to give 
girls much schooling. 

But it was likewise a prevalent idea that education 
for boys was a luxury which the privileged classes 
alone could enjoy; but, as I have said before, this 
was a time of awakening, and one direction which it 
took was in the increase in facilities for popular edu- 
cation. Here, as with higher education. New Eng- 
land led the way. The best schools were there, the 
largest attendance, the keenest pursuit of knowledge. 
Primary schools were still sorry institutions every- 
where, however. 

In these schools there could be no grading, because 
all the children, young and old, within a given radius, 
must attend the same school, which comprised only 
one room and had only one teacher. It was kept in 
a frame or log building in which there might be as 
many as eighty scholars, all under one master. The 
smallest children sat on the front benches, immedi- 
ately under the teacher's eye; the older pupils were 

134 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

at the back. The Httle ones might be as young as 
three years old, learning their A-B-C's, and there 
might be some youths who were nearly grown up. 
The discipline was very strict, the ferule, rattan, and 
cowhide being applied to refractory girls as well as 
boys without an age limit. In a few schools there 
was a whippping-post to which a bad pupil could be 
bound when he was being flogged, and there were 
instances of severe cruelty on the part of teachers. 
Notwithstanding the harshness of the system — per- 
haps because of it — mutinies took place occasionally, 
with rough-and-tumble fights between the teacher and 
scholars and consequent strife among neighbors, some 
of whom took the teacher's part, and others that of 
the scholars. One feature of the discipline and in- 
struction has, unhappily, disappeared from American 
schools. The scholars were taught manners. When 
they came into the school-room in the morning the 
boys must bow to the teacher, and the girls make him 
a courtesy. They were required to make these signs 
of respect before and after reciting, and when they 
left the school-room. When they were dismissed in 
the evening they were told by the teacher to go home 
and "make their manners" to their parents. The 
school-house was never a good building, and often 
a very dilapidated one, being cared for generally by 
all and particularly by none. The school furniture 
comprised long benches, with rude writing-desks in 
front of them, and a high home-made desk for the 
teacher on a small raised platform. This desk was 
built of planks reaching to the floor, and behind it 
was a place of deposit for confiscated tops, balls, etc. 

135 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

The school exercises were written in ink. Lead- 
pencils had been invented, but they were too expensive 
for school use, and slates had not yet been introduced. 
The scholars or the teacher made the ink by mixing 
ink-powder and water. Metal pen-points did not 
come into use till about 1830, and the teacher made 
the pens by pointing the ends of goose quills. Paper 
was expensive and was husbanded carefully. It was 
unruled, and lines were made with a ruler and a piece 
of metal lead. The district school was supported by 
tuition fees in the South, and attended only by chil- 
dren of the poorer class. In the West there were no 
classes and the district schools were used generally ; as 
they were also in the East. The teacher was paid by 
taxes in the East, which were levied in the town or dis- 
trict. In some districts there were two terms — winter 
and simimer — the latter kept by a woman when the 
men were all supposed to be engaged in farm- work, the 
former nearly always by a man. He received from 
six to twenty dollars per month as salary, and was 
boarded by different families in turn, in the vicinity 
of the school. The woman teacher received from four 
to ten dollars a month. Sometimes the teacher lived 
well and sometimes he starved. He was treated with 
respect as a personage just below the parson; but 
he was generally looked upon as a man who had an 
easy life, because he did not have to perform manual 
labor. It was in these schools that the great majority 
of the people received all their education. A child 
might enter when he was three years old; by seven 
he would be studying grammar; then he would learn 
to write and go into arithmetic. After he was ten 

136 



WEBSTER'S SPELLER 

years old his attendance at school was apt to become 
very irregular, for then he was old enough to do some 
work on the farm. The instruction was partly relig- 
ious. The Bible was read in school every day, and the 
text-books had something of religion in them. The 
first book the child had was the primer. The New 
England Primer, published in 1813 at Concord, was 
entitled "The New England Primer, or an Easy and 
Pleasant Guide to the Art of Reading, to which is 
added the Catechism" — the catechism being a score 
or more of selections from the Westminster Assembly 
Shorter Catechism, which contained upward of one 
hundred and fifty questions. The catechism was com- 
mitted to memory without any comprehension of its 
meaning, but so were most of the rules which the child 
learned. From the primer he progressed to the most 
universally used book that has ever been written by 
an American — Noah Webster's spelling-book. In 
18 1 5 it was already ten years old and had only started 
on a career, which lasted even to the school days of 
some middle-aged people who read these lines, by 
which time twenty-four million copies had been printed 
and sold. In 18 18 Webster stated that more than five 
millions of copies had already been sold. It is hardly 
an exaggeration to say that one himdred years ago 
every child who went to school studied it. Starting 
in Connecticut and Massachusetts, it soon circulated 
through the rest of the country. All children learned 
to spell from it in the same way, to divide their words 
in the same way, and, in a great measure, to pronounce 
alike. It was called an easy standard of pronuncia- 
tion. The schools, scattered so far apart, had this 

137 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

link to join them together. The book went out of 
use first in the home of its birth. It Hngered for 
many years afterward in the South and West, and 
I dare say there are schools which use it even now. 
The arithmetic was taught in the earlier stages almost 
entirely orally and without books. The printed 
arithmetics were severely practical, being, they said, 
"adapted to the commerce of the United States." 
The new cmrency having been adopted in 1792, an 
important chapter was given to instruction how to 
divide, multiply, add, etc., in "Federal money." 
There was a section devoted to barter, which was 
the form of trade with many people in the coimtry. 



XVI 

READING AND WRITING 

NOAH WEBSTER called his speller "The First 
Part of a Grammatical Institute of the English 
Language," and it was part of a plan for American- 
izing the English tongue. In the introduction he said : 

This country must, at some future time, be as distinguished 
by the superiority of her Hterary improvements as she is already 
by the UberaHty of her civil and ecclesiastical constitutions. . . . 
For America in her infancy to adopt the present maxims of the 
Old World would be to stamp the wrinkle of decrepit old age upon 
the bloom of youth, and to plant the seed of decay in a vigorous 
constitution. 

Up to Webster's time, says one of his eulogists, 
"we had been living in a state of colonial dependence, 
and were in the most complete literary vassalage to 
the mother-country." We were as little children 
"looking eagerly and reverently to the mother-coun- 
try for our supplies." Webster and his followers 
insisted that there was a connection between the liter- 
ary and political life of the nation. A correspondent 
wrote to him, November 23, 1790: 

Did not many persons oppose the adoption of the Federal Con- 
stitution at first, who soon became convinced of its goodness? 
If it had never been formed and presented to the public, anarchy 
and ruin might have been the consequences; and so if a Dictionary 

139 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

on a reformed plan of spelling should not be offered to the public, 
we shall jog on in the good old irregular, absurd way, and at last 
leave the world as servile in this respect as we found it. Is this 
the independent spirit of Americans? I should blush to own it 
— I deny it. 

A writer in The North American Review for Sep- 
tember, 1815, explained the difficulty in creating a 
national literature. It was, he said, the product of 
a national language; but America had a language 
which it had accepted from a nation totally unlike 
itself. The colonial state produced nothing, for the 
mother-country no more supposed that a colony 
could improve her literature than that it could im- 
prove her political or religious system. 

So Noah Webster led a rebellion, and had a fol- 
lowing of enthusiastic men who saw the vision of an 
independence as complete in letters as it was in govern- 
ment. It was to rest upon the broad basis of popular 
support, and was not to depend upon a favored class. 
In his grammar Webster insisted that it was correct 
to say "You was." "The compilers of grammars 
condemn the use of was with you," he said, "but in 
vain. The practice is universal, except among men 
who learn the language by books." Here was his pur- 
pose — to record the language as men used it. He 
worked toward his great end under disadvantage, be- 
cause of the isolation of the communities of America. 
Writing to him in 1806, the historian, David Ramsay, 
lamented that there was so little literary intercourse 
between the states; but such as there was came 
largely from Webster's efforts. He traveled through 
the country, lecturing on language. Before the Con- 

140 



READING AND WRITING 

stitution was adopted he petitioned the several state 
legislatures for copyright laws and obtained them 
from nearly all. This was the first official recognition 
of the existence of American authorship. 

As everything living changes, so, Webster in- 
sisted, the English language must change from time 
to time, and he would have the changes in pronunci- 
ation recognized by changes in the spelling. So he 
offered hainous for heinous, luster fbr lustre, humor 
for humour, doctrin for doctrine, and a few other sim- 
plifications. For pronunciation he pleaded for that 
which was natural, and, if possible, for that which 
was used by the ordinary man. The English lan- 
guage must, in the course of time, be shaped by Ameri- 
can usage, he thought. In his Compendious Diction- 
ary he said: 

In each of the countries, peopled by Englishmen, a distinct 
dialect of the language will gradually be formed; the principal 
of which will be that of the United States. In fifty years from 
this time the American-English will be spoken by more people 
than all the dialects of the language, and in one hundred and 
thirty years by more people than any other language on the 
globe, not excepting the Chinese. 

There had been a few radicals who wanted to make 
a new language for the United States, and there was 
a more serious effort to stop calling the national 
language English. In 1778, when Congress prescribed 
the ceremonial to be observed in receiving the French 
minister, it said that his French address should be 
replied to "in the language of the United States." 

On November 12, 1807, Webster wrote to Joel 
Barlow : 

141 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

For more than twenty years, since I have looked into philology 
and considered the connection between language and knowledge, 
and the influence of a national language on national opinions, 
I have had it in view to detach this country as much as possible 
from its dependence on the parent country. 

In his two-volume dictionary he said that many- 
words commonly employed in England were foreign 
words here — those used in heraldry, in hawking, in 
speaking of feudal tenures, for instance; and that 
many American words had no uses in England — 
those used in our land -offices, "congress," "select- 
men," and the like; and that these differences must 
be recognized as natural and proper. Dr. Johnson 
said that "the chief glory of a nation arises from its 
authors," so Webster used American authors to illus- 
trate his definitions, and quotations from Washington, 
John Adams, Franklin, Madison, Ramsay, or Ham- 
ilton appeared in the same paragraphs with excerpts 
from Hooker, Milton, Shakespeare, or Dryden. Web- 
ster represented a sane and fearless radicalism. He 
did more than any other individual to give the 
American nation an independent property in the Eng- 
lish language. He was, without any rivals approach- 
ing him, the first American man of letters. In the 
same class with him at Yale, graduating in 1778, and, 
like him, born in Connecticut, was his friend Joel 
Barlow, who followed in his footsteps and attempted 
to do for poetry what Webster tried to do for the 
language and to give it the distinctive stamp of the 
new nationality. 

The epic poem, "The Columbiad," was published 
in 1806 and went through four editions. The author 

142 





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READING AND WRITING 

said he wrote it to foster the feeling of American 
nationality, that his object was "altogether of a moral 
and political nature," that he wished "to encourage 
and strengthen in the rising generation a sense of the 
importance of republican institutions as being the 
great foundation of public and private happiness." 
Again : 

This is the moment in America to give such a direction to poetry, 
painting, and the other fine arts, that true glory may be implanted 
in the minds of men here, to take the place of the false and de- 
structive ones that have degraded the species of other countries. 

So Barlow sang of Christopher Columbus and the 
discovery and settlement of America in a poem over 
six himdred lines long, in a meter and in language 
which were borrowed, exemplifying, in fact, the futility 
of his own aspirations. There is hardly any one now 
living who has read "The Columbiad" through, yet 
the English is good, although the poetry is bad, and 
the elaborate purpose of the author is industriously 
sustained. When the poem appeared long poems 
were a popular mode of expression, and the reviewers 
generally spoke highly of "The Columbiad." Many 
people bought the book, which showed that they 
wanted a literature of their own. Doubtless many 
people admired it. They were members of a yoimg, 
immature, and ambitious nation, and thought that 
to be strong and noble which was in reality only fear- 
less, crude, and bombastic. Nevertheless, I do not 
believe that the book was ever read much. Barlow 
was known as the author of "The Columbiad," but 
"The Columbiad" was known only by the title on 

143 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the cover. In 1819 a commentator in the Uterary 
paper pubHshed in Alexandria, then in the District 
of Columbia, spoke of it thus: ' 

That huge and incongruous mass of political monstrosities, 
"The Columbiad," is now scarcely considered worthy of criti- 
cism — and is by far a greater outrage upon the memory of Colum- 
bus than ever despotism inflicted on his person. 

The periodicals all professed to have an ideal like 
Barlow's. Thus, The Portfolio, published in Phila- 
delphia, which was one of the best, declared its ob- 
ject to be "the promotion of American literature, 
the cultivation of taste, the encouragement of the 
fine arts, the inculcation of sound morality, and the 
dissemination of general truth." The lesser literary 
papers claimed the same general purpose. Some of 
them were: The Eye, published by "Obediah Optic" 
at Philadelphia, begun in 1807; The Journal of the 
Times, at Baltimore, begun in 1818; the Boston 
Weekly Magazine, begun in 18 16; and the Columbian 
Telescope and Literary Compiler, published at Alex- 
andria, begun in 1819. All of them showed a credit- 
able striving for literary expression. They were 
written in good English, they taught good morals, 
and they were patriotic. The Columbian Telescope 
was a fair example of its class, although it was not 
as good as some of the other papers. It was edited 
by "The Trio," being " Geoff ry Whimsical," a humor- 
ous philosopher; "Solomon Studious," a tiresome 
pedant, who was eternally airing a cheap classical 
knowledge, a character who appears in nearly all the 
lighter literature of the day; and "Peter Quiz," a 

144 



READING AND WRITING 

satirist of present-day habits and weaknesses. Nearly 
a third of the paper was devoted to ' ' The Parnassian 
Bouquet," being verses, some borrowed and some 
original. The poets sang of love and friendship, ad- 
monished their readers to follow the path of virtue, 
told of humorous occurrences at convivial gatherings, 
and proclaimed the glory of Columbia. The heavy 
articles were reviews of serious books, and moral and 
semi-reUgious essays. Some of the papers had a great 
deal to say about art, and the Boston Weekly Maga- 
zine had a column devoted to the theater. All the 
papers had some humorous paragraphs. These papers 
were better than papers of the corresponding class 
are at the present day. The humor was richer, the 
articles, in both prose and verse, were more carefully 
written, more thoughtful, more informing, and the 
moral tone was higher. They were beneficial in their 
influence. 

One of the lighter fortnightlies is read occasionally 
even at the present day. Salmagundi, or the Whim 
Whams and Opinions of Launcelot Langstaff, Esq., and 
Others was issued in New York for about a year. It 
was revived some years later, but not under the same 
authorship, and the charm had fled. William and 
Washington Irving and James Kirke Paulding were 
the authors of the issue of 1807. The theater, music, 
the fashions, follies, and amusements of New York 
society, were the topics treated with delightful humor 
and good taste. No names were given and the lam- 
poons were harmless. It speaks well for the intelli- 
gence of the wealthier class of residents of New York 
that they were delighted with this paper. One like 
10 145 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

it could not now survive, because the tone is too high 
and the humor too innocent to suit the taste of the 
present day. 

The monthly, bi-monthly, and quarterly magazines, 
such as the Literary Magazine and North American 
Review at Boston, The Portfolio and Analectic at 
Philadelphia, and the Monthly Magazine at New York, 
were better than the weeklies and fortnightlies. There 
were a great many religious reviews, and they also 
were literary periodicals. Almost every sect had one 
or more of them, and it is a fact which shows that 
they were not bigoted in tone that one must read some 
ways into one of them to find what sect published it. 
When Bishop John Carroll, the Catholic, died in 1815 
the Protestant reviews generally eulogized him. 

The South played no part in the literary develop- 
ment of the country. The reading class in that sec- 
tion was numerically small and very conservative in 
its habits. The planters read what English cotmtry 
gentlemen read — the classics, the English masters, 
and their own newspapers. They were slow to admit 
a new book. Very few libraries in the South contained 
the American books which were being read in the 
North and East. But the South had a civilization 
of its own and a part of it should be a literature, but 
it strove in vain to create it. It was not imtil 1828 
that Charleston had the Southern Review, and not 
until 1834 that Richmond had the Southern Literary 
Messenger. Occasionally, the Southern presses issued 
a heavy book, and this was all, except the newspapers 
and political pamphlets, that the South contributed 
to literature. 

146 



READING AND WRITING 

To name a few of the issues of the press will serve 
to indicate the direction of the public taste. In law 
there was Wheaton's Digest of Maritime Law, pub- 
Hshed at New York; in economics, John Bristed's 
Resources of the British Empire, also at New York; 
in history and biography, Belknap's History of New 
Hampshire, at Boston, and William Wirt's Life of 
Patrick Henry, at Philadelphia; in ethnology. Ward- 
den's translation of a French work on the intellectual 
and moral faculties and literature of negroes; in 
travel and adventure, John R. Jewitt's Narrative 
of Adventures during a Captivity of Three Years among 
the Savages of Nootka Sound, at Middletown, Connec- 
ticut, and Captain Porter's Cruise of the Essex, at 
Philadelphia ; in humor and fiction, John Decastro and 
His Brother's Bat, commonly called Old Crab, at New 
York, and Hugh Henry Brackenridge's Modern Chiv- 
alry, Containing the Adventures of a Captain and League 
O' Regan, his Servant, at Richmond ; in sensational fic- 
tion, Duyckinck's The Sicilian Pirate, at New York. 
Of poetry there were American editors of Bums, Camp- 
bell, and Thomson's "Seasons." There was a steady 
stream of religious books, ranging from a Charles- 
ton, South Carolina, publication, A Dissertation on the 
Prophecies Relative to Antichrist and the Last Times, 
by Ethan Smith, pastor of the Church in Hopkinton, 
New Hampshire, to John Foster's Discourse on Church 
Musick, published at Brighton, Massachusetts. The 
novels were few and were the most insignificant part 
of the publications. The public taste did not demand 
them, and for the time the production was slight. 
Charles Brockden Brown, the first American novelist, 

147 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

died in 1810, and there was no one to take his place 
for some years. 

In 1809 Irving's Knickerbocker's History of New 
York, which was really a work of fiction, appeared. It 
was received with universal applause and established 
the reputation of the author. He was the first Amer- 
ican to make a literary reputation in Europe, but he 
made it here when he applied his art to American life. 
A few years later the case of the greatest of American 
novelists illustrated again the insistence of the nation 
upon its own. 

James Fenimore Cooper published at New York 
his novel Precaution in 1820. It was an example of 
slavish imitation and literary thraldom. The style 
was EngHsh, the scene was laid in England, the char- 
acters were English, and the English reviewers thought 
the book was by one of their own authors. It aroused 
no interest in this country and deserved none. The 
next year The Spy appeared. Here was a novel with 
an incident of the Revolution for the plot, the scene 
laid in a county in New York, the characters Amer- 
icans. It leaped into success and became at once the 
most-read novel in the United States, and Cooper's 
career was fixed. 

It must be remembered that the reading public 
of 181 5 was limited, and that there were a great many 
people who could not read at all. People of this class 
now read, and a large mass of literature is provided 
for them; but in 181 5 the servant girls, day laborers, 
and poor farmers who could read were so few that 
they had no literature of their own. They had to be 
content with the Bible and the newspaper. In fact, 

148 



READING AND WRITING 

they read what more cultivated people read, but they 
read very little. Their imaginations were not ex- 
cited by books and papers designed expressly for that 
purpose. There was no slum literature. The people 
of the slums were too ignorant to read it. There were 
no department newspapers, attempting to cover the 
whole range of human wants and make themselves 
indispensable to all classes of readers. Literature 
was held to be something higher than ordinary life; 
the printing-press was considered to be the vehicle 
for depicting mankind washed and in good clothes. 

The newspapers varied greatly in merit, but they 
were all well written. They were not newspapers as 
we imderstand the term. There was no systematic 
co-operative news-gathering. The only reporting was 
of the proceedings of Congress and the state legisla- 
tures. The other news in a paper was picked up here 
and there from other papers and from letters sent to 
the editor, and there was nothing continuous about 
it from day to day. At seaports, however, the papers 
gave the entrances and clearances of vessels. One 
might read his newspaper for a month and not read 
of a crime. There was no fear of printing long articles. 
When the Hartford Convention issued its report 
January 4, 181 5, the newspapers generally printed 
it in full, although it took up a page and a half 
of the paper and was an argumentative, closely rea- 
soned state paper which no one but an intelligent 
man, well versed in the principles of government, 
could have read with understanding. Important 
speeches in Congress were often printed in full, oc- 
cupying two, three, or more columns of a paper which 

149 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

had only four pages. It was the custom to print long 
communications over assumed names, such as "Cato," 
"Falkland," "Hampden," on political questions. They 
were polemical, nearly always able, and often pro- 
found. They were apt to reappear in pamphlet form. 
Under the law the statutes were promulgated through 
the chief newspapers, being printed in extenso on the 
first page. The papers were expensive. The Phila- 
delphia Mercantile Advertiser, published daily except 
Sundays and holidays, cost eight dollars per annum; 
the Charleston Courier, also daily, the same price, but 
it issued a country paper three times a week for five 
dollars per annum; the Norfolk Herald, published 
twice a week, cost six dollars per annimi; the Rich- 
mond Enquirer, published three times a week during 
the sessions of the legislature and twice a week during 
the rest of the year, cost five dollars per annum. The 
papers passed from hand to hand and were read by 
many who could not afford to buy them. 

It is plain that people who read these newspapers 
must have had an extraordinary taste for affairs of gov- 
ernment and that they must have had a knowledge of 
them. It is plain, too, that they must have had strong 
minds if they fed them on such strong mental food. 

The newspapers conveyed to them, however, one 
form of literature which was calculated rather to stim- 
ulate their passions than to strengthen their minds; 
yet, as it was peculiarly American, it requires a word 
of notice. It was the custom of the newspapers to 
print cards or notices, signed by individuals who were 
responsible for their contents, denouncing other in- 
dividuals who were named. Often a card was also 

150 



READING AND WRITING 

printed as a broadside to be pasted up and distributed. 
On the trees near the court-houses, or in other con- 
spicuous places where many people would be sure to 
see them, these notices could be foimd. They were 
interesting and ingenious compositions and their con- 
sequences were often deadly. They were worded 
carefully, so as to convey insult, denimciation, de- 
fiance, and contempt of the individual to whom they 
were addressed. They were the prelude to personal 
affrays, duels, or murders. They were common in 
the South and Southwest, but they appeared in all 
sections of the coimtry. After the crisis which they 
produced had taken place, long circumstantial ac- 
counts of it and of the events leading up to it would 
be written by the witnesses, accessories, or principals. 
These accoimts were minute in detail and were pre- 
pared with great painstaking, and from the original 
publication might spring a considerable body of 
printed statements. This form of literature was pro- 
duced by the better educated men, but their example 
spread occasionally into the lower grades of society, 
as the following extract from the Norfolk Herald of 
June 24, 181 5, will show. It comes from a man who 
had a grievance over a question of personal property : 

NOTICE. 

The designing hypocrite who comes tinder the appellation of 
William Pendred has wantonly seeked an opportunity of dis- 
crediting me in the public papers. ... I am very sorry that I am 
reduced to the necessity of altercating with so ordinary a char- 
acter as he is known to be. Though should I be the character 
who he alludes to respecting his brother's clothes, I assert him 
to be an infamous Iyer, which would be sufficiently in my power 
to prove at any time when called upon. 

151 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

And the following is from General P. J. Hays, of 
Tennessee, a man who stood high, a friend and de- 
voted adherent of Andrew Jackson. It is undated 
and is found among General Jackson's papers: 

To the Public: 

Although I can never undertake to defend any man's conduct 
whether "right or wrong," I am not disposed to find fault with 
that fiUal sensibility which seeks to vindicate a father's fame. 
In accordance with it I have endeavoured to shew that Wm. P. 
Anderson's imputations against the character of my deceased 
father were unfounded, and that Anderson himself is so base as 
to deprive his assertions of all credit. These objects I believe 
I have accomplished. His son, R. K. Anderson, has, it appears, 
been instigated by a certain political Doctor in this place — who 
shines rather as a monkey than a catspaw — to meet the evi- 
dence I submitted of his father's dishonor by vague and vulgar 
abuse of myself — abuse as vile as his own character and which 
it is impossible for a gentleman either to utter or to notice. I 
cannot be drawn into a controversy with a person so disrepu- 
table as this Rufus K. Anderson, who is represented by his own 
father as given to thieving, and who in this case is notoriously 
the instrument of a calumniator, more contemptible, because 
more cowardly, than a highway robber — a calumniator who is 
proved to have lied away his own honor by the testimony of 
Messrs. Parrish, Foster, Fitzgerald, Black and Marshall. 



XVII 

PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

GENERAL HAYS'S friend and patron, Andrew 
. Jackson, was as familiar with posting literature 
and its consequences as any man in America. He 
had contributed both to the literature and to the 
consequences. In his propensity for quarreling and 
fighting he was an exaggerated example of a type of 
men who flourished in his day and in the part of the 
country where he lived. They were not bad men, 
but performed their public and private duties faith- 
fully, were enterprising and industrious. They held 
human life cheap, however, and placed their notions 
of honor above everything else. They thought it no 
sin to hate and harbor the passion of revenge. At the 
same time they were loyal in friendship, devoted in 
kinship, and grateful for kindness. There was a great 
deal of the Indian's nature in them. De Tocque- 
ville studied the red man and said that he was "mild 
and hospitable when at peace, though merciless in 
war beyond any known degree of human ferocity," 
and so it was with his white neighbors. They had to 
fight the Indians incessantly. Even in the more 
populous parts of the country they were removed by 
only a few years from constant Indian warfare. So, 
as they thought of Indians a great deal, they came to 

153 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

be like them, and were often ferocious and merciless 
in private warfare, when the opposing forces were two 
men who might possess all the domestic virtues.' 
Physical bravery was the most essential attribute of 
a man, and he must be ready to endure suffering with- 
out complaint, like the Indian who sang a death song 
when burning at the stake. In at least two duels 
in which he was the second. General Jackson named 
as the distance between the combatants from six to 
nine feet, the weapons being pistols. In the duel in 
which he killed Charles Dickinson in 1795 he went to 
the field determined to kill. He said afterward that 
his purpose had been so strong that he would have 
been able to stand long enough to accomplish it even 
if he had been shot through the head. Instances of 
such predominance of will power were told of and 
believed. As a matter of fact, he did shoot Dickinson 
after he had himself been badly wounded. A few 
years later Armistead Thomson Mason, soon after 
he had retired as a Senator from Virginia, was killed 
in a duel in which six paces separated the principals, 
who fought with muskets. Instances of similar con- 
tempt for death could be multiplied. Many men kept 
guns or pistols exclusively for use in duels, and some 
of them with grim humor gave their weapons proper 
names. One of the most accomplished citizens of 
Georgia, a governor, soldier, poet, and artist, called 
his dueling rifle the "Hungry Tigress," and his neigh- 
bor had one which he called "Spiteful Sue." The os- 
tensible cause of General Jackson's duel with Dickinson 
was a dispute over a wager on a horse-race; but there 
was a rumor that Dickinson and his friends wanted 

154 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

to get Jackson out of the way because of his increas- 
ing political importance, and there was another sto- 
ry that Jackson had heard that Dickinson had spo- 
ken lightly of Mrs. Jackson's reputation. Causes like 
these were the basis of many duels; but in their wake 
flowed a multitude of trivial reasons. 

Yoimg swaggerers and coarse bullies tried to get 
the name of being duelists. It added to their social 
importance, and they sought and gave insults without 
excuse. At a time when all men drank and nearly 
all drank too much occasionally, duels often came from 
the impremeditated remarks of tipsy men. Not all 
the men who fought duels had fiery tempers or bully- 
ing dispositions, however. Some were benignant citi- 
zens, who reprobated the practice and only followed 
it because a refusal to do so would have subjected 
them to the imbearable charge of cowardice and have 
resulted in a loss of their influence in the commimity. 
Alexander Hamilton accepted Burr's challenge in 1804 
because he knew that, if he refused, his career as 
a public man would be closed. In vain did the clergy 
protest against the duel^ as a violation of God's law; 
in vain did enlightened laymen denounce it as both 
foolish and wicked ; no man dared to refuse a challenge 
if it was given for what was recognized as a valid 
reason, and few dared not to send one if their honor 
was assailed. Many duels were abortive, but these 
were not the rule. Rarely were the weapons swords 
or rapiers; nearly always the long-barreled pistol or 
the heavy musket was used, and most Americans 
were good shots. 

The women were all opposed to dueling. When a 

15s 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

meeting was to take place the fact was hidden from 
them; but there were many women of gentle, Chris- 
tian lives who stood aside and allowed their men to 
go to the field of honor as they allowed them to go 
into battle when their country was at war. 

Dueling was a crime peculiar to the higher classes. 
It was remarked that "not one in ten thousand was 
entitled to leave the world in this manner." Never- 
theless, many left it in this manner. There was hardly 
a family of the planter class in the South and South- 
west that did not have one or more duels recorded in 
its annals. It was the custom of The North American 
Review to print in each issue a list of notable deaths 
by violence which had taken place during the pre- 
ceding two months, and the list nearly always included 
some one who had fallen in a duel, oftenest in the 
South, often in the Middle States, and occasionally 
in the North and East. In New England, where there 
were few of the gentry, duels were of rare occurrence. 
The bad eminence of the South was due to the pres- 
ence of a landed aristocracy which adhered to Old 
World customs, to a warm climate which produced 
an irritable physical condition, to idleness and the 
consequent gambling and drinldng, to the intolerant 
and domineering temper which came to the owner 
of slaves. More duels took place in the South in a 
month than took place in the rest of the country in 
a year. It was not till many years after the time of 
which I am writing that dueling declined, disappear- 
ing first in the East and North, then in the Middle 
States, and last in the South, giving way before the 
softening influences of a general advance of civiliza- 

156 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

tion and a modification of standards of honor produced 
by the less frequent recurrence of wars. 

Although dueling flourished in 1815, unlawful man- 
slaughter by lynching had not yet come into practice. 
When summary justice was visited it was by what 
was termed "club law," an expression derived from 
the voluntary organizations which existed in various 
parts of the country for protection against criminals 
where regular authority could not enforce the law. 
These clubs proceeded in orderly manner and not as 
mobs. Usually they warned their victims of impend- 
ing punishment, the object being to make them move 
away. Commonly they pimished by whipping. Rarely 
did they hang a man, and when they did they might 
try him before an improvised court beforehand. They 
illustrated the capacity of the people for self-govern- 
ment rather than a spirit of lawlessness. There was 
a great deal of irregular justice inflicted, immediately 
after the Revolution, when society was in a disordered 
state; there was a great deal at a later period when 
the idea of direct power of the people began to sink 
in; but between 1792 and 1819, a transition period, 
there was little. Lynching did not become an in- 
stitution until after the Civil War, when a new species 
of negro crime became prevalent. 

There were a great many escapes from the law a 
hundred years ago. Information that a crime had 
been committed traveled no faster than the escaping 
criminal, and the wild, uninhabited regions were an 
asylum which was near at hand. There was no de- 
tective system, and when a man was robbed, or when 
his slave or apprentice ran away, he invoked the aid 

157 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

of the public to apprehend the culprit and recover 
his property by an advertisement in the newspapers. 
The following from a Norfolk paper will serve as an 
example. It related to the escape of a negro woman 
who talked "very modest," but was "fond of dancing 
and smoking segars," and apparently to other prop- 
erty losses: 

... I further make public that I have bought a blood-hound 
of the most furious kind; therefore I beg my friends will send no 
young children alone to my house, nor allow their servants to 
attempt the house by the yard way, without the greatest caution. 

A great many criminals escaped punishment be- 
cause the penalties prescribed for their offenses were 
too severe. The states had inherited the common 
law of England with its long list of capital offenses 
and barbarous punishments; and where the punish- 
ment went beyond all measure it was not enforced. 
Thus in New Hampshire the list of crimes for which 
the punishment was death included murder, arson, 
burglary, felonious assault, rape, and treason. Vir- 
ginia had in her list selling a free man as a slave and 
stealing a slave. In Georgia, where a moderate code 
was adopted in 1811, counterfeiting was a capital 
crime, as it was in several other states. Yet counter- 
feiting was a common offense, the opportunities to 
commit it being numerous and the temptation too 
strong to be resisted. There were scores of different 
kinds of paper currency issued by local banks, crudely 
printed and easy to imitate, and, in consequence, 
much false money was in circulation. The severity 
of a penalty was often an indication that the crime 

158 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

was common and that an effort was being made to 
stop it by terrifying those who felt inclined to commit 
it. Under the law of North Carolina a convicted 
counterfeiter must stand in the pillory for three hours 
and have his right ear nailed to the pillory and cut 
off; must then receive thirty-nine lashes upon his 
bare back, and be branded with a red-hot iron on 
the right cheek with the letter C and on the left cheek 
with the letter M, besides forfeiting half his goods 
and chattels and suffering imprisonment. For the 
second offense — it is difficult to see how a man thus 
marked could accomplish it — the punishment was 
death. In Delaware, by an act passed February 7, 
181 7, a forger was fined and imprisoned, and then 
must "forever wear the letter F made of scarlet cloth 
sewed on the outside of his outer garment on the back 
between the shoulders, of at least six inches square." 
I have found no record of men with branded cheeks 
and only one ear wandering about the countryside in 
North Carolina, nor in Delaware of unfortunates 
wearing coats with a red F in the middle of the back. 
It must be that the punishment was inflicted very 
seldom. 

Generally speaking, the criminal law was assum- 
ing a more merciful aspect, and was leaving out the 
old idea of vengeance and punishment for punish- 
ment's sake. The prevailing tendency was indicated 
by the code adopted by Maryland in 1809, which pro- 
claimed as its object the reform of the criminal by a 
"mild and justly proportioned scale of punishment," 
and by the pronouncement of the General Assembly 
of Louisiana in 1820, "that it is of primary impor- 

159 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

tance in every well-regulated state, that the code of 
criminal law should be founded on one principle — 
the prevention of crime." 

To prevent the crime of piracy was one of the prob- 
lems of the time, and a new variety had arisen, bred 
of the political commotions which now began to assume 
an acute stage in the Spanish-speaking countries lying 
off our Southern coast. It is true that the old days of 
great piracy on the Spanish Main had passed, but the 
West-Indian waters still held a great many sea robbers, 
some engaged in the slave trade, some bearing com- 
missions as privateers, and some flying the black flag 
without pretense of lawful purpose. Some of the 
merchants of the surrotmding ports profited by the 
robberies and encouraged them, and slave-dealers in 
the United States bought from them. The slave 
trade became unlawful in 1808, and in 1820 was de- 
clared to be piracy, but slavers did not respect stat- 
utes unless they were enforced. The trade was still 
lawful in Spanish dominions, and Havana especially 
was the resort of slave-vessels, whence many slaves 
were smuggled to the mainland. The federal govern- 
ment could only lessen the iniquity ; it could not sup- 
press it. The slave coast of Africa was so long that 
it was impossible to patrol it successfully, and con- 
venient points on the Southern coast of the United 
States could be chosen for landing-places for the car- 
goes. Many thousands of slaves were smuggled in, 
scores of slave -vessels were captured, and the sup- 
pression of the slave trade presented a continuous 
problem for fifty-seven years. But the ordinary 
pirates of the West Indies did not confine themselves 

160 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

to taking slaves. All was fish that came to their kettle, 
and vessels with specie in their holds were their fa- 
vorite food. The pirates were Spaniards, Portuguese, 
negroes, and a few English and Americans, One of 
the worst pirates that ever was hanged was already- 
beginning his career. He was Charles Gibbs, bom in 
Rhode Island, and executed in New Orleans in 1831, 
after he had confessed to the murder of nearly four 
hundred people. In 1822 Lieut. William Howard 
Allen, U. S. N., was killed off Matanzas, Cuba, while 
boarding a pirate vessel, and his death excited a great 
deal of indignation. The following year a fleet under 
Commodore David Porter was sent against the pirates, 
and inflicted such severe punishment that their power 
was broken. The new variety of piracy was more 
difficult to deal with, for it was sporadic in its re- 
currence and proceeded under cover of political pur- 
poses. 

Immediately after our independence the rich do- 
main of Spain, lying almost undefended by its owner 
upon our west and south, was a constant temptation 
to venturesome Americans who hoped to gain wealth 
and power by short routes. When Louisiana passed 
to our possession they turned their attention to the 
remaining Spanish territory lying on our southern 
and southwestern border and adjacent to our south- 
em coast, and found, besides, a field for their activi- 
ties by assisting the Spanish colonies in their revolt 
against the parent state. Everybody in the United 
States sympathized with the revolt, and the revolu- 
tionists received material as well as moral support; 
but many of those who went ostensibly to assist them 
11 161 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

were looking only to their own aggrandizement and 
used the revolutions as a cloak for spoliations and 
smuggling operations. The first of these outlaws to 
estabUsh an American base were three brothers, Jean, 
Pierre, and Dominique Lafitte. They had lived in 
Louisiana and were Frenchmen by birth, but Amer- 
icans by preference. The leader, Jean Lafitte, had 
been a straight pirate, or, at any rate, was generally 
believed to have been one. They established them- 
selves at Grand Terre, an island in Barrataria Bay, 
just west of the mouths of the Mississippi River, and 
their boats sailed as privateers under the flag of the 
new Republic of Carthagena. They gathered fol- 
lowers until the population of Grand Terre numbered 
about four himdred people. Residents of the neigh- 
boring coiHitry went there to buy plimder quite openly, 
and there was an active commerce between the Barra- 
tarians and Donaldsonville and New Orleans in Loui- 
siana. Visitors who met Jean Lafitte reported that 
he was a mild-mannered man and a loss to good so- 
ciety, that he had a good cook and excellent wines — 
and some of the wines foimd their way to the tables 
of the connoisseurs of New Orleans. The Lafittes 
had ready money, and when they were indicted for 
smuggling four hundred and fifteen negroes into the 
United States and killing a revenue officer who sought 
to get evidence against them, the United States At- 
torney at New Orleans, John R. Grymes, resigned his 
office in order that he might become their lawyer, and 
Edward Livingston was the associate counsel. For 
a time they escaped punishment, but Commander 
Daniel Tod Patterson, of the navy, was sent against 

162 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

them and broke up their estabhshment. They re- 
organized and the British sought their co-operation 
in the campaign against New Orleans. Instead of 
giving it, however, they furnished valuable military 
information to General Jackson and asked permis- 
sion to join his army. Some twenty or thirty of them, 
accordingly, worked the artillery in the battle of New 
Orleans, and on February 6, 1815, were pardoned by 
the President for their past offenses. A few may have 
become good citizens afterward, but others were soon 
heard of again at Amelia Island in the St. Mary's 
River, off the coast of Florida, and at Galveston 
Island, off the coast of Texas, where establishments 
like that in Barrataria Bay were made. 

Galveston Island was taken possession of by Louis 
de Aury, a revolutionist of New Grenada, who was 
appointed Governor of Texas and Galveston in 18 16 
by the revolutionary government of Mexico. His 
ship was called Mexico Libre and sailed under the 
flags of Mexico and Venezuela. His followers were 
described as "the refuse of all nations and all colors 
collected from the mass of iniquity spread over the 
islands of the West Indies and Spanish America." 
Amelia Island was seized in 181 7 by Gregor Mac- 
Gregor, "Brigadier General of the armies of New 
Grenada and Venezuela and General-in-Chief em- 
ployed to liberate the Provinces of both the Floridas." 
He was a character somewhat more respectable than 
Aury, but his motives were the same — to gain power 
and wealth for himself. Neither the South-American 
nor the Scotchman cared a straw for South-American 
independence. MacGregor recruited his band of 

163 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

some one hundred and fifty men chiefly in the United 
States, from the loafers of Savannah and Charleston, 
but some of them were young men who had served 
in the war and joined him because they did not wish 
to return to the tame pursuits of peace. He was 
financed by an American mercantile firm, to whom 
he promised enormous tracts of land in Florida when 
his independent government should be established. 
His treasurer, Irvin, and his civil governor, Hub- 
bard, were Americans, and he bought his supplies 
in Georgia. After a time his money gave out and his 
enterprise was about to collapse, when Amy came 
over from Galveston Island and took command. The 
game then became too low for the Americans and they 
came home. Both MacGregor and Aury had issued 
many commissions to privateers, which fitted out in 
American ports and made Amelia Island their head- 
quarters. Their chief business was intercepting slave- 
vessels bound for Havana and smuggling the slaves 
into the United States. They preyed upon Spanish 
shipping in particular, but took any other that prom- 
ised profit. Amelia Island was claimed as American 
territory, and the President sent a land and naval 
force against it, and the outlaws were driven from 
both islands. These were the earliest of a long line 
of irregular expeditions, having their support in the 
United States, against established government in 
Spanish-speaking America. Robbery and smuggling, 
which were the only objects of Lafitte, and the chief 
objects of Aury, and in part the objects of MacGregor, 
gave way to a preponderance of political objects in 
the later filibusters. 

164 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

The West-Indian waters were the Hounslow Heath 
of the sea, and there were many routes on the land 
also where the traveler was in danger from robbers. 
Where the temptation is there the crime will be found, 
and the travel of men with merchandise and money 
in small companies, or alone, through uninhabited 
regions, where there were no police, offered opportu- 
nities of enrichment which highwaymen did not neg- 
lect. There was no collusion with them on the part 
of men who did not themselves break the law, as there 
was with the pirates, and nobody profited by them 
except the keepers of the brothels and receivers of 
stolen goods. On the other hand, everybody used the 
highway, so there was general and cordial co-operation 
to apprehend highwaymen. Their depredations were 
infrequent in the most populous parts of the country; 
but there was no part where one could travel far with- 
out passing through regions that offered good places 
of escape to a robber. In the South were large tracts 
of canebrake and swamp where he could take refuge 
and feel secure. The borders near Spanish or Indian 
territory were favorite places for the outlaws. Es- 
caping to Spanish jurisdiction, they were more apt to 
be welcomed than to be given up, and nobody cared 
to follow them far among Indians. They were taken 
usually when they came to the towns to spend their 
money and to pawn the watches they had stolen. 
The highway yielded a rich toll. One robber before 
he was hanged told how he had secured thirty thou- 
sand dollars from a single merchant who was on his 
way to the market to buy goods, and how he got 
ten thousand dollars from one robbery of the mail- 

i6s 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

stage. In the mail between North and South was 
much paper currency, and men buying and selHng 
slaves were provided with large sums. The flow of 
money between the sections of the country was very 
large. 

The supreme crime of the highwayman was to rob 
the mail, an offense against federal law punishable 
by death. In 1830 George M. Dallas, United States 
Attorney at Philadelphia, in prosecuting a mail rob- 
ber put the situation truly. 

"In no country on the globe, perhaps, is the mail 
exposed to greater danger than in this," he said. 
"The danger arises from the nature of our country, 
its vast extent, and the comparative sparseness of 
its population. We are on the threshold of a bound- 
less and unexplored continent. Some of our mails 
travel through dark and dismal forests and deserts, 
over mighty rivers, through gloomy swamps, and on 
untenanted mountains, continually incurring all kinds 
of danger." 

There was strong temptation to rob in the cities, 
too, for the watch was poor and the streets were 
dark after nightfall. Footpads were common and it 
was not safe to walk far at night. Nearly every citi- 
zen carried arms for his protection, however, and the 
criminal stood in greater fear of private punishment 
than he did of the city police. 

When we consider the chronic crimes which have 
always afflicted civilized communities, we must re- 
member that there was no large criminal class in the 
United States, there being, in fact, no good breeding- 
place for one. Nowhere was there a dense urban 

166 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

population; nowhere was there a large number of 
people sunk in poverty and vice and crime, contam- 
inating one another. Individual cases of poverty and 
crime because of it were common enough, but poverty 
and crime were not propagated. The wayward youth 
with a deformed moral natiu"e developed his criminal 
propensities, and weak natures succumbed to temp- 
tation. They were natural products and society was 
not responsible for them. On the other hand, while 
the danger of criminal contagion was absent the in- 
dividual developed without the restraining influence 
and standardizing of conduct which come from the 
absorption of the individual by the group. It is 
probable that men allowed freer play to their pas- 
sions than they do now and that crimes arising from 
the passions were more common. There were many 
illegitimate births. There were houses of immoral re- 
sort in the country districts, where they do not now 
exist. Many foundlings were picked up. Heavy 
punishments were provided for the mother who con- 
cealed the death, whether by natural causes or not, 
of her bastard. In New Hampshire she was set upon 
the gallows for an hour and then imprisoned. One 
of the most atrocious murders of the day was that of 
his illegitimate child by a farmer and his wife; an- 
other was that of his wife by a young man of good 
family connections who had become infatuated with 
an abandoned woman. 

The causes of murder followed familiar lines — 
jealousy, cupidity, and mad passions moved men to 
kill, as they moved Cain when he killed Abel, and 
Eugene Aram when he killed the shoemaker in 1745, 

167 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

and Professor Webster when he killed Dr. Parkman 
in 1849. There was a dreadful murder in 18 15 by 
a young man in Virginia, who robbed his victim in 
order to get money to enable him to pay a gambling 
debt. 

As we have seen in a former chapter, foreigners 
generally criticised Americans for the eagerness with 
which they tried to make money, and declared that 
they were unscrupulous in the methods they employed. 
In plain words they thought them cheats. But Amer- 
icans when they went abroad complained that they 
also were cheated. It would seem, in fact, that 
people have always complained of being cheated by 
unfamiliar methods. We had in America, however, 
certain phases ot cheating which were our own. The 
desire to get rich quickly prompted men to take 
gamblers' chances, and there were, in consequence, 
many failures and bankruptcies which were essen- 
tially dishonest. There was a certain callousness 
toward bankruptcy which did not exist in England, 
for here it was hardly considered a disgrace. It was 
under control of state laws. The federal government 
had authority to regulate it, but there was no gen- 
eral bankruptcy law between 1803 and 1841. The 
state laws treated it variously and too leniently, and 
speculators took advantage of the opportunity they 
afforded to cheat their creditors. 

On the other hand, embezzlement had not yet be- 
come a common crime — indeed, it was not yet a 
crime at all in many of the states. Punishment and 
redress could be accomplished by indirect means, 
but the direct crime was unknown to the common 

168 




THE CITY PRISON, OR BRIDEWELL, WEST SIDE CITY HALL 




THE debtors' prison, SUBSEQUENTLY THE HALL OF RECORDS 



PIRATES AND DEBTORS 

law. Nor were there many embezzlements. Bank- 
ers and their clerks sometimes stole other people's 
money. The safeguards to prevent breaches of trust 
were not elaborate and the breaches of trust were 
rare. The great temptations in this direction arose 
at a later day with the coming of large corporations 
and central storehouses of money. 

The offense of running into debt and failing to 
pay was punished by imprisonment. The insolvent 
debtor could, however, obtain relief from indefinite 
imprisonment by presenting his case in court. Never- 
theless, there were prisons for debtors in the larger 
cities, and in the towns the jails generally contained 
a few of these unfortunates. There was much popular 
sympathy for them, and often it took the practical 
form of a subscription to pay a debtor's creditors 
and release him. Probably the debtor's prison at 
New York was the largest. It was situated on the 
park on the east side of the City Hall, nearly adjoin- 
ing Chatham Street, and was a small stone building 
of three stories. It was open to visitors all day. The 
prisoners were obliged to furnish their own food and 
the Humane Society helped those who were unable 
to do so. In 1817 there were thirty-four men and 
one woman in the jail itself. But the limits of the 
jail extended to the surrounding cormtry and em- 
braced about one hundred and sixty acres. Within 
this area lived the great majority of the debtors, 
who furnished security against their escape, which 
was satisfactory to the jailer, and paid a small fee. 
There were between five and six hundred of these 
debtors. In spite of general disapproval of impris- 

169 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

onment for debt, it was allowed to stand as the 
law until New York led the way for abolishing it 
in 1831. 

The great cause of debt, as it was of other crimes, 
was indulgence in strong drink. 



XVIII 

VICE 

AS Bulwer Lytton said, when he was told that 
J~\ loaded dice had been found in the ruins of 
Pompeii: "Some of the virtues may be modern, but 
all the vices are ancient." ^ Nevertheless, some vices 
are practised more actively by one generation than 
they are by another and become in a sense the prop- 
erty of that generation. It cannot be claimed, how- 
ever, that the vice of drunkenness was the peculiar 
property of the generation of 1815. Probably there 
was more of it than there had ever been before; but 
it may be doubted whether there was as much of it 
as there was a generation later. However this may 
be, it was a time-dishonored vice and impartial ob- 
servers declared that it was the besetting sin of the 
Americans. Men were hard drinkers everywhere; 
they were supposed to be perpetually athirst; but 
the best that could be said for Americans was that 
they were no worse in this respect than the Irish, who 
were the worst in the world. It was estimated that 
they spent more money on strong drink than upon 
religion and education combined. The head of a well- 

* I have borrowed this quotation from an official opinion writ- 
ten by James Brown Scott when he was Solicitor of the State 
Department. 

171 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

to-do family spent hundreds of dollars a year upon 
his cellar, and a part of nearly every man's earnings 
went for strong drink. Soldiers, sailors, laborers, 
and working-men generally drank rum or whisky regu- 
larly every day. It was even served to the prisoners 
in the jails. There were many men who took a dram 
every morning before breakfast, who drank through- 
out the day, and took a "nightcap" just before going 
to bed. They were partially under the influence of 
alcohol all the time. There were others who began 
drinldng in the afternoon and became intoxicated 
every day. The convivial spirits constituted a con- 
siderable proportion of the population. They took 
pride in their capacity for drinking and boasted of 
the amount of liquor they consumed. The Americans 
were not a wine-drinking people, except among the 
opulent class, who imported the wine. There was 
no wine of the country. The earlier stages of ex- 
tensive agriculture were not favorable to grape cul- 
ture and the minute care necessary to make wine. 
So distilling grain, fruit, or molasses was resorted to 
for drink. There was a large exchange of products 
with the West Indies, and heavy importations of 
molasses, which was made into rum, the liquor most 
universally used. No restriction was put upon dis- 
tilling and the product was not taxed until after the 
Constitution went into effect, when the imposition 
of a federal tax raised a rebellion in Pennsylvania, 
because it was a novelty and was thought to be an 
infringement upon a right which the farmers had al- 
ways enjoyed. So, with ardent spirits accessible to 
all, many became addicted to their use. There was 

172 



VICE 

a general complacency toward drinking. A drunkard 
was held in contempt, but a man who got drunk did 
not incur disgrace. The Literary Messenger and 
American Register of Boston in the March number, 
1807, had some humorous paragraphs on "The Mis- 
eries of Social Life," and gave this as one: 

On entering the room to join an evening party composed of 
remarkably grave, strict, and precise persons, suddenly finding 
out that you are drunk; and what is still worse, that the company 
has shared with you in the discovery, though you thought you 
were, and fully intended to be, rigidly sober. 

Even at fimerals spirits were served, and at town 
meetings the most sober men drank at the taverns. 
Nobody dreamed of absolutely stopping the evil; 
to mitigate it was the utmost hope of the reformers. 
Earnest efforts were made in this direction. Ben- 
jamin Franklin had shown the folly of drinking, and 
Dr. Benjamin Rush treated the question from a medi- 
cal standpoint in 1784. These and the teachings of 
other wise men had an effect. The churches battled 
with the evil, but the outlook was not encouraging. 

The first temperance society was organized near 
Saratoga in 1808. It was called the "Temperate 
Society," and the members agreed not to drink rum, 
gin, whisky, or wine, under a penalty of twenty-five 
cents for each offense, except at public dinners. No 
member should become intoxicated, under a penalty 
of fifty cents. One of the members who had a farm 
and was in the limiber business related how it had 
been his custom to buy a hogshead of rum for his 
laborers each year, but, since he had embraced the 
temperance doctrine, he had diminished the amount 

173 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

materially. He found it necessary, however, to pro- 
vide liquor for some of his laborers, who would not 
work for him unless he did so. A temperance society 
appeared in Massachusetts in 1813. There was one 
at Morristown in 1825, each member of which pledged 
himself not to drink more than a pint of apple-jack 
a day, a quart having been the allowance up to that 
time. The Methodist Church directed its efforts to 
preventing its ministers from distilling and selling 
liquor. It was not till 1836 that the efforts for re- 
form became a crusade for total abstinence. Then 
it was that strong drink was banished from use in 
the family and at social entertainments, from the 
workshop and the harvest field, and that there ap- 
peared, as a consequence, innumerable tippling houses 
or saloons, the offspring, as the recorder of the move- 
ment has stated, "of the American temperance refor- 
mation." Afterward serious attention was given to 
the question of invoking the law to enforce temperance 
or total abstinence. James Appleton made a report 
on the subject to the Maine legislature in 1837, and 
Neal Dow passed his law in 185 1. In 1840 the 
"Washingtonian movement" began in Baltimore. 
Three reformed drunkards got other drunkards to 
reform and sign a pledge not to drink. They got 
others; the practice spread, and the whole country 
was ablaze with oratory from men who related their 
experiences when they were slaves to their appetites. 
We are told that there was at one time 600,000 of 
these reformed drunkards. Most of them returned 
to their bondage after the novelty of virtue had worn 
off. There was no such thing as an inebriate-asylum 

174 



VICE 

in the world till that at Binghamton, New York, was 
opened, the corner-stone being laid in 1858. 

But the work of the country was not done by the 
drunkards in 181 5 any more than it has been since. 
Probably there were fewer drunkards in public life 
than there were at a later period, because the pub- 
lic officials came in the main from a more refined 
class. 

Going along with the drunkenness, the two being 
the chief vices of the time, was the vice of gambling, 
which had the sanction of the law everywhere to the 
extent of the lottery, which had been a favorite mode 
of raising money from colonial days and was regularly 
invoked by the Continental Congress to prop up the 
tottering finances of the country. Afterward it was 
used by the states for all sorts of purposes — to build 
churches, schools, hospitals, and roads. It was such 
an easy and certain mode of raising money that it 
continued to be resorted to even after its demoraliz- 
ing influences were generally admitted. It was rea- 
soned that it did public good even if it worked private 
harm. It was the poor people especially who sup- 
ported it, instead of saving their surplus. It was an- 
tagonistic to habits of saving. In 1833 a society was 
organized in Pennsylvania to advocate its suppression. 
Public opinion indorsed the movement. Soon official 
lotteries ceased; then all were forbidden by law. 

That form of gambling which was practised by 
more people than any other, except the lottery, was 
betting on horse-races, and everywhere in the country 
to a greater or less degree horse-racing was indulged 
in. It was not lawful in New England, nor in New 

175 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

York between the years 1802 and 1821, and was put 
under the ban in Pennsylvania in 1820; but nothing 
could prevent horse-lovers from testing the speed of 
their horses, or stop emulation among them, and 
where there were no tracks there were races along the 
road or scratch races before the taverns. 

In New England running-races never became popu- 
lar, and the interest in horse-breeding was not so 
strong as it was in the other parts of the country, 
but it was there, especially, that the trotting-horse 
was developed. In 18 10 a Boston horse astonished 
the country by trotting a mile in less than three min- 
utes at Philadelphia. The line of trotters did not be- 
gin till 1824, however, when Trouble went a mile in 
2:43. The races were usually under saddle, but in 
1 8 10 a light two -wheeled sulky was experimented 
with and soon afterward races were trotted under 
conditions similar to those which now prevail, but 
the distances were usually two or three miles. 

There was no interest which so much pervaded all 
classes and all sections as the interest in horses. 
Every one had to notice them, whether he had a nat- 
ural liking for them or not. They carried him wher- 
ever he went; he was absolutely dependent upon 
them for a hundred necessary purposes. It was 
deemed a quality of manliness to ride and control 
a horse well. The idea of a gallant and admirable 
man was a man on horseback. No one described 
the attributes of a noted individual without speaking 
of his abilities as a horseman. Even President Madi- 
son, although a man of sedentary tastes and without 
any fondness for sports, had a fine stallion on his farm 

176 



VICE 

in Virginia, and owned an interest in a race -horse 
with Dr. Thornton. 

While the home of the race-horse was Virginia, the 
whole South and Southwest, and to a less extent 
the Middle States, were breeding horses from English 
and Virginia stock. As it happened, the greatest 
horse in the country. Messenger, was owned in New 
York. He died in 1808 at Townsend Cock's stable 
on Long Island. The greatest race of the generation 
was that between American Eclipse, a New York 
horse, against Sir Henry, a Southern horse. It took 
place in 1823 on the Long Island course, and it was 
estimated that one hundred thousand people saw 
Eclipse win. Everybody knew the names of the great 
horses ; everybody took an interest in the great races ; 
and thousands of people bet on them who did not 
bet on other events. The country storekeeper, who 
acted in some sort as the banker for his patrons, 
would sometimes advance the stakes on a race to a 
customer, receiving his payment in produce delivered 
from time to time. When Messenger died every hu- 
man being in the United States knew it who was old 
enough to know anything. It was regarded as a 
national calamity. He was given a military funeral 
and volleys of musketry were fired over his grave. 

The oldest track in the country was the Washington 
course near Charleston, where races took place every 
year in the latter part of February. Beginning on 
Wednesday, they lasted for the rest of the week, and 
on Friday night the great jockey-club ball took place. 
The races were free, a stand was provided for the 
common people, and there were special accommo- 
12 177 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

dations for ladies. The schools were closed so that 
the pupils might go. The whole population gathered 
at the course, and many visitors came from other 
states. At a race meeting there were not many races 
in a day, and not many horses entered a race. In 
fact, there were few horses which were capable of 
the severe test that a race put upon them. The dis- 
tances were two, three, or four miles in heats. The 
principal event was usually a four-mile race, and it 
often happened that the best horses would run twelve 
miles before one of them had won. The great quali- 
ties they exhibited can be appreciated when the 
time they took to cover the course is considered, for 
they ran the third heat almost as fast as they did the 
first. Taking the time from a race in 1811 at Charles- 
ton, the first heat was run in eight minutes and four- 
teen seconds, the second in eight minutes and two 
seconds, and the third in eight minutes and thirteen 
seconds — which was not considered notably fast going. 
There was no regular circuit racing. The meets, ex- 
cept at Charleston, were not at stated periods, but 
took place as the result of the challenge of one horse- 
owner by another. Thus, the Richmond Enquirer for 
March 25, 1815, announced that a match race would 
take place at New Market (Petersburg) on April 27th, 
between James J. Harrison's horse by Sir Archy 
against Abner Robinson's Optimus for a purse of 
five thousand dollars, in heats of two miles, best two 
in three. On the following day, for a purse of two 
hundred and fifty dollars, there would be a race under 
the same conditions open to any nag. The advertise- 
ment was inserted by a tavern-keeper who offered to 

178 



VICE 

reserve accommodations for gentlemen with their 
servants and horses, who intended to come to the 
races. The sectional rivalry showed itself in the 
races. The localities from which the horses came 
were laid stress upon and called forth demonstrations 
of local pride. In 1806 there was a great race at 
Washington, D. C, in which horses from Maryland, 
Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey took part. It 
was looked upon as a contest for supremacy between 
four states. 

Let no one who has seen a professional horse-race 
of the present day suppose that it gives him an ade- 
quate idea of the course a hundred years ago. The 
colts which sprint a few hundred yards and cannot 
maintain a racing speed for a full mile are poor imi- 
tations of the horses which used to circle the track 
four times, take a rest of half an hour, do it again 
and then again. The old racing demonstrated all the 
fine qualities of the horse, and the modern racing is 
his degradation. The sport which was under the con- 
trol of horsemen who gambled has fallen into the 
hands of gamblers who race. They know nothing 
about horses, and few of them can ride. To them the 
race-track is only a great roulette- wheel and the horses 
only expensive balls. The elements of the crowd 
have changed. A few rich idlers, a large number of 
professional gamblers who systematically follow the 
races from place to place, men from the streets who 
like to gamble when they can, all transported to the 
meeting in trolley-cars and automobiles — by any 
other means than horses — ^have taken the place of 
the indiscriminate gatherings of earlier days, when 

179 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

lawyers, doctors, even a few clergymen, farmers, rich 
and poor, public officials, clerks, apprentices, small 
shopkeepers, horse-traders, and blacklegs came to- 
gether, impelled by a common interest. We have 
lived to see editorials written on the "Passing of the 
Horse." Many years ago he ceased to have any use- 
fulness for purposes of travel. A machine-driven car 
is now supplanting him for city and suburban pur- 
poses also. He is even being pushed off the country 
roads. He is rapidly becoming only the drudge of 
the farm. It is true that he lingers as a toy of rich 
men, but they will soon discard him, because he has 
no basis of usefulness to them. The children have 
been born who must live their lives without an in- 
terest which has been the concern of mankind since 
before the days of Job, and has influenced the minds 
and characters of many millions of men. The deep- 
reaching changes which modern inventions are mak- 
ing have a remarkable illustration, the full significance 
of which we cannot fathom, in the elimination of the 
interest in horses. 

Many of those who were the victims of the passion 
for horse-racing also found a means of combining 
gambling and sport by following the ancient amuse- 
ment of cock-fighting. Here, as in horse-racing, Vir- 
ginia was the pioneer, but the pit which was most 
steadily in use was that at New Orleans, which, hav- 
ing been a Spanish town, had retained the taste for a 
sport in which Spaniards have ever taken peculiar de- 
light. In Maryland, however, there was much cock- 
fighting, and to a less degree it prevailed through- 
out the country. The most important mains were 

i8o 



VICE 

those fought by the cocks of one locahty against 
those of another. The law did not notice the sport 
particularly, and it was not considered an evil, ex- 
cept in New England, where all games were deemed 
to be sinful. 

Nor had the law as yet need to notice the fighting 
of men in a ring before spectators for stakes. Such 
fights occurred, but there were no elaborate prepara- 
tions or advertisement, and the general public took 
no notice of them. A good fighter became known to 
other ruffians, but there was no recognized champion 
American pugilist. A negro from Georgetown, D. C, 
named Molineaux, appeared in England in 1810 and 
claimed the title. His boasts were believed and he 
fought with some success; but very few people had 
heard of him in America. The first ring fight under 
rules was fought in 181 6 between Jacob Hyer and Tom 
Beasley; but it would never have been remembered 
if it had not been that Jacob Hyer had a son named 
Tom who became the first champion prize-fighter of 
the American ring some twenty-five years later, and 
his fame was so great that his father's exploits were 
recalled. 

But the gambling spirit which found an outlet in 
betting at sports more or less coarse and cruel also 
sought sirtipler and more direct means of satisfaction. 
Accordingly, there was much card - playing, dice- 
throwing, billiard-playing, and table-gaming, and es- 
tablishments were provided where men who de- 
manded facilities for ruining themselves could be 
supplied with everything that was necessary for the 
piu"pose. Unhappily, the universal custom of marry- 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

ing early caused suffering and hardship to innocent 
wives and children of the wretches who gambled 
away their substance and died in their youth among 
the unclean. The evils of gambling had become acute, 
and there was an outcry against it. In this year 
old Parson Weems, still calling himself the former 
rector of Mt. Vernon Parish (which he had never 
been, for there never was such a parish), issued a 
pamphlet in Baltimore in which he depicted in lurid, 
but not exaggerated, colors the horrors which re- 
sulted from gambling. There were many other writ- 
ings to the same effect. Hardly any one dared to 
defend gambling. In all the states except Louisiana 
gambling-houses were forbidden by law. Neverthe- 
less, they flourished to a greater or less extent through- 
out the country. At the summer resorts, especially 
the springs of Virginia, there was gambhng during 
the season. Games were found wherever there were 
race meetings. The round or banking games were 
the same as those which now prevail, but the names 
of some of them have probably been changed. There 
was roulette, "the wheel of fortune," "black and 
red," "equality," "E. O.," and "A. B. C.," but the 
favorite game was faro. A certain "Major" Robert 
Bailey flourished at this time, and after he had run 
his race and ruined himself a number of times and 
dragged others down with him he wrote an interest- 
ing account of his career. He kept a faro-bank at 
the Sweet Springs and the Berkeley Springs in Vir- 
ginia, where he had a large and profitable patronage. 
At the Berkeley Springs he had a boarding-house or 
hotel, over which he and his handsome mistress pre- 

182 



VICE 

sided, where the cuisine was excellent and the drinks 
were mixed by an expert whom he had brought from 
Philadelphia. His guests included foreign diplomats, 
people of fashion, and profligates young and old. He 
went to Philadelphia, where, in a room in the Mansion 
House Hotel, he fleeced his visitors at faro. When 
he was in Washington he lived at O'Neill's and must 
have enjoyed an acquaintance with the future Mrs. 
Eaton. He consorted with men of fashion, as the 
list of his creditors when he went into bankruptcy 
shows. 

In Richmond there was Mr. Strass (or perhaps 
Strauss), who had a gambling-resort which was well 
patronized. He provided a good dinner for his guests, 
who paid for it indirectly. Some of the inveterate 
gamblers of the town dined with him every day. A 
novice entering his rooms was surprised at some of 
the people he met there, for among them were citi- 
zens of high standing and seemingly respectable lives 
— solid family men, church members — evening wolves 
who walked the streets by daylight clad in the garb 
of innocent sheep. 

There was a vice of the day which we do not call 
a vice. To break the piety of the Sabbath by fol- 
lowing amusement or doing work was considered to 
be a wicked and a vicious act. The observance of 
the day was the care of the law. It was supported 
by the argument that Sunday as a day of rest was a 
necessary civil institution, but the law was made for 
religious purposes and had its basis in the Fourth 
Commandment. An ominous revolt against the ex- 
treme features had arisen and received encourage- 

183 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

merit from the federal government. The post-offices 
in the larger towns, to accommodate their patrons, 
fell into the way of opening their doors for a time oii 
Sunday to receive and deliver mail. In 1810 Con- 
gress passed a law requiring postmasters to deliver 
mail every day in the week. There must have been 
a wide-spread demand for this innovation ; but in the 
nature of things it was not as loud and clamorous as 
the voice of the opposition, which expressed a con- 
viction that one of the most sacred and essential of 
divine institutions was being assailed. The cry went 
up that the morals of the country were being ruined. 
Petitions poured in upon Congress to repeal the law. 
They came by the hundreds from New England and 
by scores from the rest of the country. The denom- 
inations forgot their differences and spoke in concert 
against the impious innovation. The petitions were 
alike in tenor. "That the Sabbath," said one from 
Fannettsburg, Pennsylvania, in 181 5, "according to 
their [the petitioners'] belief is an ordinance of God, 
instituted from the beginning of the world, and always 
regarded by believers in revelation as a blessing," 
etc. The conscientious observance of the day, said 
another from the West, "constitutes one of the best 
foundations of the virtue and happiness of any people." 
One argument against the law was that it conflicted 
with state laws which forbade such labor as the de- 
livery of the mail required. The battle raged for 
years; the archives of both Houses of Congress are 
loaded with the petitions, and several good reports 
were made upholding the American doctrine of free- 
dom in religious observances. The enemies of the 

184 



VICE 

law feared, with reason, that it would prove to be 
an opening wedge in breaking up the perfect quiet 
and inaction on Sunday which they wished to main- 
tain. 

Still, the quiet and inaction prevailed to a notable 
degree everjrwhere in the country; but in New Eng- 
land it assumed an extreme of solemnity which made 
Sunday the most disagreeable day of the week. De 
Tocqueville gives us a description of a New England 
city on Sunday, which might be applied in a less de- 
gree to all the cities in the country except the for- 
eign city of New Orleans. He said that all social 
movements began to be suspended on Saturday even- 
ing. The streets were in solitude and silence. Chains 
hung across them in the neighborhood of the churches. 
The shutters of the houses were half closed. Now 
and then a solitary individual glided silently along 
the deserted streets and lanes. The city seemed to 
be dead. On Monday morning, at early dawn, the 
rolling of carriages was heard, the noise of hammers, 
the hum of a busy population. The city was alive. 
In Massachusetts the law of 1792, confirmed in 18 16, 
forbade not only all working, but all games and rec- 
reation, and decreed that no one should travel, no 
ship leave the harbor, no one lounge at the tavern, 
and that any person in health who without suffi- 
cient reason should omit to worship God in public 
for a space of three months should be fined. No 
hackney carriage could drive into Boston or leave 
the town on Sunday, unless the driver had a certifi- 
cate of permission from a justice of the peace. There 
was some laxity in enforcing the law, and in 18 14 

185 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

complaints were made to the legislature, which passed 
resolutions advising all ministers to read the laws on 
the subject of Sabbath observance to their congre- 
gations and to preach to them on the subject of obey- 
ing them. A society was formed "for the suppres- 
sion of vice in general and particularly of profanity, 
intemperance, and the profanation of the Lord's day." 
It met at Burlington, Middlesex County, in 1814, and 
took into consideration especially the increasing vio- 
lation of law by traveling on Sunday. Steps must 
be taken to punish the violators, so that the people 
might continue to enjoy the Sabbath "in the same 
uninterrupted quiet and solemn stillness as the fathers 
of New England enjoyed it." The law must be in- 
voked. "Vice may be bold and clamorous," said 
the association, "when opposed only with timidity, 
but will at once shrink from the grasp of loyal au- 
thority sanctioned by public opinion," and as re- 
ligious observances on the Sabbath were "more effec- 
tive in restraining vice and enforcing moral duties 
than civil laws," it was the duty of the state to guard 
over them. What was the custom in Massachusetts 
was the custom in all New England. Perhaps the 
Sabbath was even more severely observed in Connec- 
ticut than it was in Massachusetts. The day in New 
York was a little freer, but in Pennsylvania it was 
solemn enough to suit the strictest. In the South 
the customs were less severe, but everywhere the day 
was set aside for religious observance, rest, and ab- 
stinence from amusements. 

Somewhat akin to the vice of Sabbath-breaking 
was the vice of swearing and blaspheming which was 

186 



VICE 

an offense against the divine command exclusively. 
All the states had laws on the subject, but they did 
not enforce them. The habit of swearing was well- 
nigh imiversal and went unrestrained ; but blasphemy 
would have been punished if there had been occasion 
for it. The law of Maryland, passed in 1793 and 
adopted by Congress as the law of the District of 
Columbia, may be cited as an example of the extreme 
horror of blasphemy which the community felt. It was 
in force in 18 15, but nobody was tried under it. It 
provided that any one who should blaspheme or curse 
God, or deny our Saviour Jesus Christ to be the Son 
of God, or should deny the Holy Trinity, the Father, 
Son, and Holy Ghost, or the Godhead of any of the 
three persons, or the imity of the Godhead, should 
for the first offense "be bored through the tongue 
and fined twenty pounds," and for the second offense 
be branded on the forehead with the letter B and 
fined forty poimds, and for the third offense suffer 
death. 



XIX 

THE WICKED 

WHEN a person was arrested in 1815 for vio- 
lating the law he was confined in the coiinty 
jail, the state's prison, or the penitentiary. He fared 
badly in any one of them. Even if he entered prison 
with a gentle heart and virtuous desires he came out 
a hard criminal and an enemy of society. Some of 
the prisons were dirty, and some were clean ; some were 
lighted and ventilated, and others were not; some had 
humane masters, and the keepers of others were brutes; 
but in all of them the criminals were confined indis- 
criminately, young and old, the most abandoned with 
the most hopeful, youths fourteen years old with 
patriarchs of crime, the suspected with the convicted, 
misdemeanants with felons, debtors with murderers. 
Classification had not yet been undertaken. There 
were six, twenty, even thirty prisoners in a cell. In 
some prisons they worked; in most they did not, but 
idled away their days, told vicious stories and con- 
cocted further crimes. Liquor was served with ra- 
tions in some prisons ; it was purchasable in all. The 
prisons were, in fact, seminaries of crime. 

But the penitentiary system had been established. 
Imprisonment had been substituted for more acute 
suffering as punishment after conviction. It was 

188 



THE WICKED 

based upon the expectation that it would not only 
deter from the commission of crime, but would re- 
form the criminal and turn him into a useful citizen. 
The penitentiary at Philadelphia was the first one 
established, and Pennsylvania was the mother of a 
reform which stands as one of the milestones to mark 
the progress of civilization. William Penn had sub- 
stituted imprisonment and labor for the death-penalty 
in the early days of the colony, but the English gov- 
ernment had disapproved the change and ordered a 
return to the sanguinary punishments of the common 
law. After independence the state revived its plan. 
It suited the Christian spirit of the Quakers. Ed- 
ward Livingston in his work on criminal jurispru- 
dence said of them: 

In every society for promoting education, for instructing or 
supporting the poor, for relieving the distresses of prisoners, for 
suppressing vice and immorality, they are active and zealous 
members; and they indemnify themselves for the loss of the hon- 
ours and pleasures of the world by the highest of all honours, 
the piirest of all pleasures — that of doing good. 

So in Pennsylvania capital punishment could be 
inflicted only upon those who were found guilty of 
murder and treason, and the branding-iron and stripes 
had disappeared from the criminal law. In 1790 the 
penitentiary was built and the cellular system intro- 
duced. Each prisoner was confined alone; he could 
not contaminate or be contaminated; if he did not 
reform he did not corrupt. But it was confidently 
believed that he would reform, and for the three years 
the system had prevailed the results had been prom- 
ising. Unfortunately, the penitentiary became crowded 
V 189 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

and solitary confinement was abandoned. The prison 
then became no better than any other. Upon the 
revival of the original plan humanitarians pinned their 
hopes. 

The other states had followed Pennsylvania in put- 
ting up penitentiaries and accepting the humane 
principle they stood for, but none of them had as yet 
a system of solitary confinement. A penitentiary at 
New York was built in 1796, at Richmond in 1800, 
at Charlestown, Massachusetts, in 1804, at Wind- 
sor, Vermont, in 1808, at Baltimore in 181 1, at Cin- 
cinnati in 1816. Connecticut had modernized the old 
prison at the Simsbury copper-mines. By 182 1 four- 
teen of the states had penitentiaries. But the public 
was asking, where were the reformed criminals? In 
truth, there were none, and it was plain that the new 
system had failed to produce any. In consequence, 
a serious sentiment began to manifest itself in favor 
of returning to the old way — of increasing the list of 
capital crimes, of inflicting personal cruelty in pub- 
lic, of making the criminal law a pitiless and terrify- 
ing master to the wrong-doer instead of a firm but 
merciful parent. Against this reaction the gentler 
spirits of the time contended resolutely. They in- 
sisted that cruel punishments did not deter from 
crime as effectively as milder punishments did; that 
they aroused feelings of rebellion against the law and 
of hatred and revenge in the criminal himself and in 
those who from similar education and association 
sympathized with him; that the experience of a 
thousand years had shown that crimes had been 
most common when the laws against them had been 

190 




EDWARD LIVINGSTON, AUTHOR OF THE CRIMINAL CODE FOR 
LOUISIANA 

From a painting which hargs in Whig Hall Princeton University 



THE WICKED 

most severe. Besides, the infliction of cruel punish- 
ment brutalized society. It could not see its agents 
act a cruel part under its orders without itself being 
degraded. To these arguments the merciful doc- 
trines of the New Testament were always added, 
and always with effect upon a population which 
was composed almost entirely of zealous Christians. 
Various organizations were formed to relieve the mis- 
eries of ill-treated prisoners; but a part of their 
propaganda was always advocacy of the penitentiary 
system. The individual writers and workers had the 
same objects. The Society for Alleviating the Mis- 
eries of Public Prisons in Philadelphia, the Massa- 
chusetts Society for Prison Discipline, the Society 
for the Prevention of Pauperism in New York, and 
Caleb Lowndes, a Quaker writer, Mathew Carey and 
Edward Livingston, with many others, worked with 
the same purpose. The great hope which they never 
lost sight of and never lost faith in was that a way 
would be found of reclaiming the criminal. In the 
face of poor facilities for experimentation, and even 
of failure of experiments when the facilities were good, 
they never ceased to believe in the innate nobleness 
of man, and to prosecute the search for the method 
by which the germ of virtue which lay in the nature 
of every man might be developed, and the criminal 
transformed into a man of rectitude and self-respect. 
They were not, generally speaking, tmder delusions 
with respect to the duty of society to itself as well 
as to its enemies. Their great hope at this time was 
in solitary confinement, and they wished to give it 
a fair trial, although they knew that it was a terrible 

191 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

punishment. In 1816 the state of New York, fol- 
lowing the Pennsylvania system of 1790, built the 
prison at Auburn. The prisoners were not allowed 
to see or speak to a human being, nor to hear the 
human voice. The experiment was abandoned be- 
cause many of the prisoners went mad under torture 
by comparison with which the rack and thumbscrew 
were mild correctives. From the abandonment came, 
at a later day, the system of working the prisoners 
in company but in silence, and separating them at 
night. In 1818 the legislature of Pennsylvania de- 
creed that the conventional sentence of imprison- 
ment at hard labor should be changed to solitary 
confinement — "such an entire seclusion," said the 
law, "of convicts from society and from one another, 
as that during the period of their confinement, no one 
shall hear, or see, or be heard by, any human being 
except the jailor, the inspector, or such other persons 
as, for highly urgent reasons, may be permitted to 
enter the walls of the prison." It was some time, 
however, before the state had the means of trying 
this method. A serious detriment to all the experi- 
ments that were being made was the use that poli- 
ticians made of the offices in the penitentiaries. The 
scientific humanitarians complained bitterly that the 
prisons were in charge of imtrained and incompetent 
keepers, the friends of politicians, and that they were 
changed as often as the political complexion of the 
appointing power changed. This was the rule to 
which there were a few honorable exceptions. There 
was complaint, also, of the use of the pardoning 
power by the governors of the states. Tendcr- 

192 



THE WICKED 

hearted citizens signed petitions for pardon in un- 
worthy cases; the governors erred upon the side of 
mercy; the criminals hoped for pardon instead of 
striving to reform; the many who were disappointed 
were embittered by the spectacle of unjust discrim- 
ination. 

Of the reformers the one whose writings showed 
the deepest research and the most philosophical con- 
sideration of the subject was Edward Livingston, and 
his work on the Criminal Code for Louisiana placed 
him among the first social scientists of the world, 
being received with as great appreciation in Europe 
as it was in the United States. It is impossible to 
read his chapter on the "Code of Reform and Prison 
Discipline" without recognizing the statesman-like 
manner in which he applies his erudition, humani- 
tarianism, and philosophy. He had great hopes in 
the revival and proper application of the Pennsyl- 
vania system, but he would add to it preliminary 
houses of detention, where the suspected and the 
unconvicted should be confined, and houses of refuge 
and industry, where prisoners who had shown signs 
of regeneration might find employment and subsist- 
ence after leaving prison and before acceptance by 
society. 

Even if the solution of the problem of reforming 
criminals was still in the dark in 1815 public opinion 
had left behind the barbaric idea of retaliatory pun- 
ishments for crime, and humanity had scored a 
triumph. 

13 



XX 

THE POOR AND SICK 

THE same reformers who gave their attention to 
the proper mode of deahng with criminals also 
took concern for poverty and the best methods of 
dealing with it. Originally, the only institutions 
which cared for the poor were the churches. They 
had their poor-boxes in America as they had them in 
older countries, and the clergy distributed the alms. 
They did not abandon the practice, but as popula- 
tion increased and became more diverse in its ele- 
ments the churches could not reach all the poor and 
had not resources sufficient for their relief. 

Everybody in the United States believed with 
Mathew Carey that this was "a country far more 
prosperous than any other portion of the habitable 
world." Nevertheless, it had its derelicts, unfortu- 
nates and physically incapacitated, who were not 
able to make a living for themselves and must be 
supported by others. Most of them — in fact, nearly 
all who were not immigrants — were supported by 
the charity of individuals. I have said in a previous 
chapter that the members of the community were 
closer to one another than they have become in the 
specialized life of the present day, and knew one an- 
other better. So the misfortunes and distresses of 

194 



THE POOR AND SICK 

some were known to the others and were reHeved by 
direct ministration. This form of charity was consid- 
ered to be a virtue, and it was encouraged. No ques- 
tion arose about its pauperizing effect. In fact, it had 
an advantage in this respect over institutional charity, 
for the person who helped his unfortunate neighbor 
had personal knowledge whether or not the case was 
a worthy one. In consequence of the personal as- 
pects of beneficence those who received it gave loy- 
alty and gratitude in return. These qualities also 
were held to be virtues. It would have been hard, 
on the one hand, to find an individual who held direct 
charity to be an economic error, or, on the other, one 
who believed that a part of the possessions of the suc- 
cessful or fortunate belonged of right to him. 

This was the age of the predominance of the family. 
It was still the microcosm of the state, and accepted 
responsibilities toward poor and disabled members. 
The well-to-do families had many dependent members, 
women chiefly, but old and worthless men also. The 
law could be invoked to compel families to care for 
their own. In Pennsylvania, for example, one who 
could not support himself must be supported by his 
father or grandfather, or by his mother or grand- 
mother, or by his children or grandchildren. Edward 
Livingston proposed that the obligation be extended 
to the collateral ancestors and descendants also. 

For the helpless, friendless poor, without ties or 
kindred, the communities, cities, towns, or counties 
generally made legal provision. If there were only a 
few of them they were boarded with private families; 
if they were numerous enough almshouses were built 

195 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

for them. The Friends of Pennsylvania had estab- 
Hshed an almhouse as early as 17 13. There was a 
city almshouse in Philadelphia in 1730. By 1815 all 
the cities had them. They served to accommodate 
a great variety of imfortunates — orphans, foundlings, 
the sick and insane, besides ordinary paupers. In 
the almshouse at New York in 1809 there were five 
hundred and thirty-eight adults, two hundred and 
twenty-six children, and one hundred and sixty-six 
sick in the hospital. In the Boston almshouse in 1823, 
out of some three hundred inmates seventy - eight 
were sick, seventy-seven were children, and nine were 
maniacs. Lying-in rooms were included in most of 
the almshouses. Attached to them were houses of 
employment where paupers who were able to work 
were required to render some return for their sup- 
port. In the seaports and fast-growing cities the 
poverty was greatest, especially among foreigners 
who worked at digging or on the streets. When the 
winter came their work stopped and they must be 
fed and housed lest they die. Of the inmates in the 
New York almshouse not one in five was an American. 
One of the earliest efforts to remedy the evils of 
indiscriminate association in the poorhouses came in 
the founding of orphan asylums. The Orphan Asylum 
Society of the City of New York was organized in 
1806, being the first in the United States. It devel- 
oped from the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows 
with Small Children, a woman's association founded 
in 1797, the members of which went about the city 
rendering succor to poor women and children. It 
was the first woman's charitable organization in New 

196 



THE POOR AND SICK 

York. They found many orphans, and were impressed 
with the injustice of associating them with grown 
paupers, so they induced other philanthropists to 
join in providing a separate asylum for them. In 
1807 they were supporting twenty orphans, and there- 
after the number increased rapidly. In 181 1 the legis- 
lature granted the asylum five hundred dollars, and 
this was the beginning of state recognition of its duty 
to assist in the work of educating orphan children 
to be good citizens. The Roman Catholic Church 
opened an orphanage in New York iniSiy. Ini8i5 
one was started in Washington, with Mrs. Madison 
at the head of the board of managers and a number 
of ladies associated with her. Orphan asylums soon 
multiplied and became a regular part of the policy 
of dealing with the unfortunate classes. They were 
always started by private benevolence, but many of 
them received assistance from the public taxes after- 
ward. 

Associations for charitable purposes were not many 
nor important. There was one in New York called 
the Association for the Relief of Respectable, Aged, 
Indigent Females, formed in 18 13, probably the ear- 
liest effort to establish a home for poor old ladies. 
There was a Female Charitable Society at Provi- 
dence, Rhode Island, organized in 1802, and the 
Washington Benevolent Society of Massachusetts, or- 
ganized on Washington's birthday, 181 2, with the 
chief citizens of Boston as members. These organi- 
zations had a limited field. The day of combination 
and co-operation had not come. 

The problem of dealing with the insane was being 

197 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

discussed, but had not as yet been solved. The 
Pennsylvania Hospital, which was the oldest in the 
United States, having been opened in 1752, had been 
projected partly with a view to giving treatment to 
the insane, and half the building was given over to 
them; but it was not entirely a free institution, and 
in 181 5 only admitted some twenty-five lunatics. 

The treatment of the insane was practically the 
same throughout the country. If they were violent 
they were sent to jail; if they were harmless they 
went to the almshouse or were boarded with private 
famihes. When hospitals were erected they were re- 
ceived there, but they had no hospitals of their own. 
The well-to-do families sent insane members to the 
hospitals or kept them at home or employed private 
keepers for them. Many thousands of insane people, 
who ought to have been in asylums where their com- 
fort and health could be cared for by trained at- 
tendants, roamed at large, often to their own injury 
and always to the injiuy of normal persons, who be- 
came familiarized with the sight of their affliction 
and indifferent to it. Some brutal individuals made 
sport of it, and it was a common sight to see a crazy 
wretch followed by a tormenting crowd of boys and 
men. The provision for the insane in Pennsylvania 
was not so good as it was in New York, but was equal 
with that of other states. The Friends opened an 
asylum at Frankford in 181 7 which accommodated 
fifty patients. The Pennsylvania hospital held in all 
about two hundred. There was no provision by the 
state government till 1848. There was no asylum 
in Washington till 1841. There was none in Massa- 

198 



THE POOR AND SICK 

chusetts till 1839. It was not until 1839 that the in- 
sane were moved from Bellevue in New York to a 
hospital of their own, this being the beginning of the 
Bloomingdale Asylum. In 1826, of one himdred and 
eighty-four patients in the hospital eighty-two were 
insane. The treatment they received was barbaric. 
Heroic methods prevailed in the treatment of most 
diseases, and the violence of insanity was dealt with 
by violent methods. It is not necessary to open this 
record of horror. It was the benevolent Dr. Benjamin 
Rush who invented a " tranquilizing chair," in which 
a frenzied insane patient could be strapped so cleverly 
that he could not even move his head, this torture 
being administered with the idea that it quieted him. 

There was not a school for the deaf and dumb in 
the country, and there were only twenty-five in the 
world. In 181 7 Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet opened 
his school for deaf mutes in Hartford, and in the same 
year one was started in New York, but there were 
no others for many years. There was no institution 
for the blind until a generation later, that at New 
York, established in 183 1, being the first one. But 
in 1820 several young physicians opened the New 
York Eye Infirmary in two rooms at No. 45 Chatham 
Street and rescued hundreds of people from blind- 
ness. Until then affections of the eye were commonly 
supposed to be inciu-able. 

From the almshouse and treatment of sick paupers 
developed the public hospital. When the new alms- 
house was opened in New York at Bellevue in 1816 
it included two hospital pavilions, whence came Belle- 
vue Hospital. The patients were numerous enough, 

199 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

but they did not receive much care, for in 1817 there 
were more than two hundred of them attended by 
one visiting physician, who came twice a week, and 
one house physician, who also compounded all the 
medicines administered. The Pennsylvania Hospital 
existed apart from the almshouse, but most of the 
patients paid for treatment. The Philadelphia Hos- 
pital was a part of the almshouse and was opened 
about 1812. 

People who could avoid it never went to the hospitals. 
They looked upon them with dread which was not 
ill-fotmded, for most of them were overcrowded and 
unsanitary, and those who entered were more apt to 
die than to recover. They were intended as chari- 
table institutions limited to the sick poor who were 
without homes. The earliest hospitals in Pennsyl- 
vania had been for sick strangers exclusively. 



XXI 

DOCTORS 

GEORGE WASHINGTON died on December 14, 
1799, when he was sixty-seven years old. Until 
his fatal illness he was in full manly vigor. The new 
century came in with solemn thoughts of the great 
services he had rendered his country. In truth, no 
man had ever done more for a country than he had 
done for America; but his work had been finished 
for nearly three years before his death, and there was 
no promise of further public usefulness for him. 
Events had taken a new turn and were leading into 
paths which were strange and uncongenial to him. 
His last remarks before he took to his bed with the 
ailment from which he died were in criticism of James 
Madison, spoken "with some degree of asperity," as 
Tobias Lear relates, and Madison was soon to be 
President and his party in the ascendant. History 
has no regrets to record at the removal from the stage 
of an actor who has played his part. Nevertheless, 
it is highly probable that General Washington would 
have lived for some years longer if his doctor had 
treated in the proper manner the disease of which 
he died. He was attacked by inflammation of the 
upper part of the wind-pipe, or what the doctors 
now call acute edematous laryngitis, a very danger- 

201 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

ous malady under any circumstances, but Dr. Craik, 
his physician, did not examine his larynx, for there 
was no instrument then invented to enable him to do 
so. He was given an emetic, purged, bled, and blis- 
tered, and the seat of his disability was not directly 
treated at all. No patient suffering as he suffered 
would now receive the treatment he received. Yet 
Dr. Craik was a skilful physician, and his two con- 
sultants were also good doctors, and their diagnosis 
of the case was doubtless correct. No other doctor 
would have done any better than they did. 

The causes of few diseases were known, and the 
treatment of all was wrong. The great specific of 
the day was mercury, which Dr. Benjamin Rush 
called the "Samson of the materia medica," but 
opium was freely administered, and Peruvian bark. 
The most efficacious part of the treatment, however, 
as nearly everybody thought, was blood-letting. 
There was a small number of doctors who protested 
against it, but they were overwhelmed by the great 
majority of doctors and laymen who were loud in 
its praises. They thought that it lessened the morbid 
and excessive action in the blood-vessels and removed 
fever, that it lessened pain, induced sleep, prevented 
hemorrhages, and was a safeguard against relapses. 
The doctors prescribed it for all sorts of fevers, for 
pulmonary consumption, diabetes, asthma, idiocy, 
hysteria, madness, catarrh, gout — for everything, in 
short, except a few hopelessly debilitating ailments 
where it would certainly kill. The bleeding was not 
generally performed by a physician, but by a barber 
who was a specialist in this branch of surgery. He 

202 



DOCTORS 

cut open a vein in the arm, the neck, or the foot. Oc- 
casionally an artery would be lanced; but that was 
a very dangerous way of taking blood and was re- 
sorted to rarely. Leeches and the cup were used some- 
times, and toward the end of the practice were the 
usual way of drawing blood. Bleeding was freely 
practised in treating disease until about 1850. Even 
now, in some of the older towns, an old barber may 
be foimd whose sign proclaims him to be also a "cup- 
per and leecher." 

Before a patient was bled he was given an emetic 
and a purge and mercury to produce excitement and 
inflammation of the glands of the mouth and throat 
and abstract excitement and inflammation from the 
more vital parts. This was especially desirable if 
there was morbid congestion and excitement of the 
brain. Besides this, the patient was usually blistered. 
After complete depletion had been accomplished there 
would be nothing for the disease to work on, and the 
patient should recover. If any one looks with horror 
upon the course of treatment he can reflect that the 
profession in 18 15 looked with horror upon the course 
which had been followed by the doctors of the gener- 
ation before them. And, whatever may be said of 
the medical profession in America, it must be admitted 
that it represented the most advanced knowledge of 
the day. Benjamin Rush died in 18 13, when he was 
the most influential physician in the country. His 
contemporary and successor as the head of the pro- 
fession was Philip Syng Physick, also of Philadelphia. 
Both were graduates of the medical school at the 
University of Edinburgh; so were David Hosack, 

203 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

who led the profession in New York ; Ephraim Mc- 
Dowell, of Kentucky; John Collins Warren, of Bos- 
ton, and many others. The Scotch school was in the 
ascendant, and the Scotch school was thought to be 
the best in the world. Medicine was practised here by 
the pupils of Dr. William Cullen, a great light in the 
history of medical science. He was the first physi- 
cian to generalize the phenomena of disease; but he 
was devoted to theory, and said it did not matter 
whether practice or theory came first ; so his followers 
were disposed to subordinate practice to theory. Dr. 
Rush in the lectures he delivered to the medical stu- 
dents at the University of Pennsylvania quoted from 
Cullen a great deal and said that in medicine there 
were ten false facts to one false theory; but Rush 
introduced into the science the teachings of John 
Brown, also a student at Edinburgh, who had com- 
bated CuUen's generalizations. The layman need not 
enter into a consideration of either school, as both 
are dead. A greater than Cullen, John Hunter, of 
London, of whom it has been said that he "laid the 
foundation of all those improvements in surgery, 
physiology, and comparative anatomy which have 
been made since his time," was the preceptor of Dr. 
Physick and of several other American doctors. In 
fact, Physick practised with him for a time and de- 
clined his offer of partnership in order to return to 
Philadelphia. 

The American physician was essentially ^ prac- 
titioner, however. He had so much to do that he 
could not undertake research. He was ruled largely 
by authority, and he contributed little to medical 

204 



DOCTORS 

science, although his practical habits enabled him to 
add something to the advance of surgery. In 1790 
Rush offered some new principles in medicine, sug- 
gested by his observation of the peculiar phenomena 
of diseases in the United States, and from this grew 
what he and his followers called "an American sys- 
tem of medicine." They traced all diseases to morbid 
excitement produced by irritants acting upon debility. 
All prescriptions were applied to forming and fluctu- 
ation states of disease. 

The country was in the main a healthful place of 
abode. There was a great deal of fever, which it was 
believed came from the exhalations of marshes, from 
decayed vegetable matter, from old rotting timber, 
stagnant water, bad sewerage, and lack of drainage. 
The fevers were classed as remittant, malignant or 
yellow fever, and chronic or nervous fever. They 
also called the last-named typhus, and did not sep- 
arate typhoid fever from it till 1829. The doctors 
treated all fevers on the theory that they could be 
broken up. It was not till 1822 that Dr. Jacob Bige- 
low, of New York, suggested that many diseases were 
self-limited and that their duration could not be 
limited by art. The changes in climate and exposure 
produced a great deal of catarrh, and all catarrhs 
were lumped together. There was much rheuma- 
tism. It was considered to be an external disease 
due to cold and damp. There was a form of malig- 
nant sore throat which became epidemic occasionally 
and killed many children. It was really diphtheria, 
but was treated as croup. Much suffering and disease 
was occasioned by decayed teeth, and the only dentists 

205 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

were a few in the large cities. The free consumption 
of ardent spirits with salt meat and bad cooking 
produced a great deal of dyspepsia. There was al- 
ways an increase in sickness among the men of a com- 
munity after a public dinner had been held. Dr. 
Rush thought that diseases of the mind were increas- 
ing, and attributed them in part to the intemperate 
political feeling and the excitement of the pursuit 
of wealth by speculation. No nerve diseases were 
classified as such. Pulmonary consumption carried 
off its thousands every year. It was regarded as in- 
curable and was treated with the usual heroic reme- 
dies; but the fact that life in the open checked it was 
understood. It was remarked that Indians did not 
have it. There was a great deal of gout. It was held 
to be quite distinct from rheumatism, because, as 
Dr. Hosack explained, it came from internal causes, 
and rheumatism never did. By laymen generally it 
was considered to be proof that he who had it lived 
well and that his ancestors had lived well, that he 
had an excusable fondness for good wines and rich 
cooking and was of virile, manly habit. It was sup- 
posed to separate him definitely from the laboring 
part of mankind. The doctors said it followed glut- 
tony, drunkenness, and debauchery more than any 
other causes, but the other causes were so amiable — 
as, for example, long exercise of the understanding 
in study — that a man who was sick with the gout 
never concealed it. If he was sick with some other 
ailment it might require inquiry to discover what it 
was, but if he had the gout the disease was proclaimed- 
There was no dispute about the remedies — bleeding, 

206 



DOCTORS 

purging, an emetic, salivation, blistering. The faculty 
sought for a quick remedy, for, as Dr. Rush said, 
"Who has not read of the most interesting affairs of 
nations being neglected or protracted by the princi- 
pal agents in them being suddenly confined to their 
beds or chairs for weeks or months by a fit of the 
gout?" 

What made the death-rate high at various times 
in certain parts of the country were the epidemics of 
disease. Several which had scourged Europe had not 
yet visited our shores. The bubonic plague and chol- 
era were not yet known. An epidemic of influenza 
swept over the country from South to North in 1789, 
and again in 1807, from Northeast to the South and 
the West, and there were a great many deaths from 
it — how many was not recorded. In New England 
between 1806 and 181 7 what was known as "spotted 
fever" prevailed in many parts. It was treated as 
typhus, but was probably typhoid. Smallpox ex- 
isted more or less all the time. It was accepted as a 
matter of course; but, the population being scattered, 
it had no such material to work upon as the dense 
populations of Europe afforded, and the mortality 
from it was not nearly so great. Inoculation of the 
smallpox virus was practised to a small extent long 
before Jenner's discovery. The first virus of cowpox 
was sent by Jenner to Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, of 
Boston, in 1800, and by 1802 vaccination was common 
in that city. Dr. Hosack at the same time introduced 
it in New York, and the doctors of Philadelphia 
adopted it. Dr. Waterhouse sent the virus to Thomas 
Jefferson, and he had some three hundred people in 

207 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Washington vaccinated. Many reputable physicians, 
however, refused to believe that giving a person cow- 
pox would render him immune from smallpox. Fur- 
ther, a prejudice arose against inoculation, which 
still lingers, from the fact that occasionally it com- 
municated other diseases. It made its way, however, 
and by 1815 the terrors of smallpox had diminished 
to a great extent. 

Far worse than the smallpox or than any other 
disease, more dreaded, more fatal to the commimities 
which it visited, more discussed and studied, was the 
yellow fever. It was essentially a city disease; there 
was little or none of it in the country; and, while it 
made its way occasionally to towns in the interior, it 
belonged chiefly to the seaports or river ports near 
the sea. It appeared as far north as Portland, Maine, 
and at Portsmouth, Boston, Providence, New Haven, 
and New London; but it was more terrifying than 
dangerous at those places, the deaths from it being rela- 
tively few. Every year or two Baltimore, Norfolk, Wil- 
mington (North CaroHna), Charleston, and Savannah 
had it. New Orleans had it worst. There was some 
of it every summer, and some summers hundreds of 
deaths from it — 800 in 181 7 and 2,190 in 181 9. The 
two cities which it visited with most fatal effect were 
the two largest, Philadelphia and New York. In 
Philadelphia in 1793 it killed more than 4,000 people 
in a population of 55,000; in 1798, when two-thirds 
of the population had fled, it killed 3,500. In subse- 
quent years there was a small number of deaths, and 
it gradually disappeared. In New York in 1795 
732 people out of a population of 40,000 died of it; 

208 



DOCTORS 

in 1798, 2,086; in 1803, 606; and in 1805, 262. It 
has been practically unknown in that port since 1822. 
The description of the epidemic of 1793 in Philadel- 
phia will apply with modifications to the epidemics 
in other cities — even to the last one in New Orleans in 
1878. Most of those who could do so fled into the 
country, but after the disease had begun its ravages 
they found few communities that would receive them, 
and many had to stay at home in consequence. They 
were afraid to walk the streets, and shut themselves 
up in their houses, with the shutters closed. Smoking 
was supposed to prevent infection, and women and 
children could be seen puffing cigars. Others chewed 
garlic or put it in their shoes to keep off the fever, 
being recommended to do so by the doctors. Gun- 
powder, tobacco, niter, were burned in all the houses, and 
they were sprinkled with vinegar. Those who ventured 
abroad held handkerchiefs impregnated with vinegar 
or camphor to their noses, or carried pieces of tarred 
rope in their pockets, or had smelling-bottles filled 
with what was known as "thieves' vinegar," a con- 
coction which it was said had been used at Marseilles 
during the plague by certain thieves who successfully 
robbed the dead. Many people bled themselves, be- 
ing afraid of infection from the barbers because they 
had bled infected persons. Three of the four news- 
papers of the city stopped publication, and the public 
offices were closed. The dead were buried without 
ceremony or attendants at the funerals. A person with 
signs of mourning on his person was avoided. The 
well deserted the sick ; the living deserted the dead ; the 
hearses in the streets were the only sounds of travel. 
14 209 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Dr. Rush and Dr. Physick, who began his American 
career in time to fight the epidemic of 1793 and to 
have the disease himself, became the leading authori- 
ties on yellow fever, and were convinced that they 
knew its origin and how to treat it. They bled copi- 
ously and gave enormous doses of calomel, rhubarb, 
and jalap, with a low diet and cooling drinks and ap- 
plications of cold water to the body. They saved a 
great many of their patients; but Dr. Edward H. 
Clark says of Rush, that his "pathology was erroneous 
and his therapeutics atrocious." Rush's printed ob- 
servations of the disease were important in future in- 
vestigations, however. In 1800 "Peter Porcupine" 
(William Cobbett) published a newspaper called The 
Rush Light, which ran for seven numbers and was 
devoted to abuse of Rush's methods and personal 
villification of him, and in consequence Rush sued 
him for libel, and he was fined five thousand dollars. 
But Dr. William Currie, a more responsible antagonist, 
was bold enough to protest against the accepted 
methods of treatment, declaring that they weakened 
the patient too much. He also insisted that the 
disease was not communicable from infected bedding 
and similar sources and that it invariably came as 
an importation from the South. He had a following, 
but the great preponderance of intelligent public 
opinion was with Rush's school. Of the origin of 
fever they thought as Dr. Pinkard said: "To look 
for it in ships and vessels, or to strain the eye across 
the ocean, in order to fix its birthplace on the opposite 
coast of the Atlantic, or to trace its descent from the 
slaves of the Indian seas, was to overlook the reality 

210 



DOCTORS 

in search of a phantom. It needs no foreign parent; 
the prolific earth is its mother; its father the bright 
god who governs the day." 

Nevertheless, there were quarantine regulations in 
all the ports, but they did not keep yellow fever out, 
as the trade was large with the West Indies, and es- 
pecially with Havana, where the fever always existed. 
The gradual disappearance of the disease was due 
to stricter quarantine enforcement; but the people 
of a hundred years ago knew about as much of its 
cause as we did imtil the army surgeons made the 
wonderful discovery of the communicating mosquito 
a few years ago. 

The doctors in America did their best to extend 
their influence and knowledge. There were medical 
journals of good repute in Philadelphia, New York 
City, Rochester, Baltimore, and Boston. There were 
state medical societies in all the states, which fixed 
the standard of medical education. As we saw in a 
previous chapter, there were medical schools at Yale, 
Harvard, Dartmouth, Columbia, Brown, the Uni- 
versity of Pennsylvania, and the University of Mary- 
land. One was opened at Transylvania University, 
at Lexington, Kentucky, in 1818; at Bowdoin College, 
at Brunswick, Maine, in 182 1 ; at the College of Physi- 
cians and Surgeons, in Fairfield, New York, in 18 16; 
at Cincinnati in 182 1 ; at Castleton, Vermont, in 1820, 
Between 18 10 and 1819, 1,375 physicians were gradu- 
ated. In 181 5 the medical apprentices at the alms- 
house and the students in the hospital and the uni- 
versity in Philadelphia were given permission to 
attend the surgical operations in the Pennsylva- 

211 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

nia Hospital, and this was the beginning of the 
cHnic, 

A doctor was a surgeon and even a dentist as well 
as a physician, but in the coimtry the blacksmith 
sometimes relieved his neighbors of toothache by 
rough extraction. A few dentists were practising, 
however, in New York and Philadelphia, the first 
ones having come from France. The art of making 
artificial teeth was imderstood ; and John Greenwood, 
one of the earliest dentists in New York, made a fine 
set out of ivory for General Washington in 1790 and 
again in 1795. It was not until 1839 that a dental 
school was established, the Baltimore dental college 
being the first. 

There was a strict limitation to the powers of sur- 
gery, not only because of the ignorance of the causes 
of disease, but also because there was no anesthesia, 
that discovery not being made till 1846. A patient 
who was operated upon lay conscious and writhed 
in pain as the knife cut into him. His cries rent the 
air, and he had to be held forcibly upon the operating- 
table by strong attendants. Under these conditions 
operations must be performed very rapidly and could 
not be very complicated. The record of American 
achievement in surgery is creditable and showed 
originality and daring. In 1809 Dr. Ephraim Mc- 
Dowell, of Danville, Kentucky, performed an opera- 
tion upon a woman which has since become common 
and has saved many lives; but at the time the pro- 
fession refused to accept it, and he derived no credit 
from his discovery. Dr. Richard S. Kissam, of New 
York, performed the operation of lithotomy, or cut- 

212 



DOCTORS 

ting for stone in the bladder, with great success. In 
1818 Valentine Mott, of New York, tied the innomi- 
nate artery, a feat never before accomplished. Wright 
Post, also of New York, performed a successful oper- 
ation for aneurism of the femoral artery in 1813. 
In that year John Ingalls, of Boston, made an ampu- 
tation at the*shoulder-joint. Dr. Walter Brashear had 
made one at the hip- joint at Bardstown, Kentucky, 
in 1806. The most celebrated of all the surgeons, 
the father of American surgery, was Dr. Physick. 
Until his death in 1837 no sick or injured man thought 
he had had the full benefit of medical science or 
surgical art unless he had been a patient of Dr. 
Physick's. 

Dr. Hosack and his colleague in New York, Dr. 
Samuel Bard, were the pioneers in the science of 
midwifery. In 1807 Bard published the first American 
book on the subject, and the same year Hosack was 
made professor of midwifery and siu*gery in the 
College of Physicians and Surgeons. That branch 
of the profession still hung upon the borders of re- 
spectability. Until Dr. William Shippen had lectured 
upon it at the University of Pennsylvania in 1780 
no student learned it. It was not a compulsory 
course for the doctor's degree at that school till 1843. 
It was still largely in the hands of old women, and a 
considerable proportion of women died in childbirth. 

The profession was harassed by radicals, revolu- 
tionists, charlatans, and quacks, but it fought them 
off and was in complete possession of the field. It 
had never heard of Hahnemann, although he was 
laying down his peculiar dogmas at this time and 

213 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

proclaiming the efficacy of very small doses of medi- 
cine. The regular school believed in furious doses 
and thought there was curative quality in the nau- 
seous taste of its medicines. The first appearance 
of Hahnemannism in the United States was when 
Dr. Gram began practising in New York in 1825. 
Strangely enough, there was some discussion among 
the doctors of Mesmer's theories of curing disease by 
animal magnetism. He was known partly because 
Dr. Franklin had served on the committee which 
investigated his claims in Paris and Lafayette had 
once been his pupil. Of course, his methods were 
regarded as nonsensical, but there was a general un- 
derstanding that a doctor to be successful should 
make his patients believe in the curative powers 
of his treatment. Many people followed the charla- 
tans. In a former chapter we saw that thousands 
resorted to a faith-curer in Vermont. They adver- 
tised as the same class does now. In a Savannah 
or a New York paper you read the same proclamation 
of the wonderful cures effected by Dr. 's snake- 
root, which cost only twenty-five cents a bottle. 



XXII 

COOKS 

Do the people make the country, or does the coun- 
try make the people? We are fond of speaking 
of man as the conqueror of nature, but does not 
nature govern him quite effectively? If the climate 
of a country is such as conduces to health and energy 
in the man, and the soil yields abundantly for his food, 
he will thrive. His surroundings will adapt him to 
them. Some of the emigrants to America have come 
from crowded countries where each family has farmed 
an area of a few acres, and at first they have been 
appalled at the prospect of farming a hundred acres or 
more; but, unless they have passed the learning age, 
they have accommodated themselves to the larger 
area. It is impossible that their natures should not 
expand with their industry and that they should not 
become hundred-acre men in their ideas, so to speak. 
After all our boasting, then, it would seem that the 
American continent, being a magnificent domain, gave 
a magnificent destiny to the people whom it nourished. 
The greatest credit that they can properly claim is 
that they left behind them the outworn customs with 
which centuries of usage had burdened them in Eu- 
rope, and that they preserved the liberty with which 
the New World clothed them when it received them. 

215 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

"The destiny of nations depends upon the manner 
in which they nourish themselves," and the Americans 
of one hundred years ago had a right to look forward 
to the future with confidence, for there were no people 
in the world so abundantly supplied with food as 
they were. 

When Captain John Smith came to Virginia he 
found the Indians cultivating com, and from this 
beginning it became the most universally used food 
of the white settlers. The Indians pounded it in a 
stone mortar and made it into meal. Adding a little 
water, they formed it into a cone which they cooked in 
the hot embers of a fire. The white man put a similar 
cake upon a hoe and put the hoe on the fire, whence 
came the hoe-cake and com bread. Indian com was 
believed to be the most wholesome single article of 
food in the world, and the one most capable of feeding 
the whole man. There were few people in the United 
States one hundred years ago who did not eat it 
every day of their lives. 

In due season all the domestic food animals of 
Europe were imported and thrived in every part of 
the country; and beef, mutton, pork, and the barn- 
yard fowls became plentiful. Besides these, there was 
a great variety of game — turkeys, geese, ducks, pheas- 
ants, pigeons, and smaller birds, all so plentiful in 
their appointed seasons and places that the people 
were free to feed upon them. Venison, too, was avail- 
able in all parts of the country and was eaten almost 
as much as beef. What is now food which only the 
rich man can enjoy was then accessible to all classes 
of the population. The waters abounded in fish — 

216 



COOKS 

cod, carp, mackerel, salmon, shad, bass, and a hun- 
dred other kinds. Shell-fish were found along the 
coast and in the adjacent rivers and bays. Only the 
interior regions were without oysters. Terrapin were 
plentiful in the rivers and bays from Pennsylvania to 
Florida, and sea- turtles on the Southern coast. All 
the common garden vegetables were grown — Irish and 
sweet potatoes, peas, beans, cabbage, cauliflower, car- 
rots, parsnips, celery, artichokes, and a number of 
others. The tomato was almost the only garden 
food they missed. They called it the love-apple, and, 
as it was a variety of the nightshade, they thought 
it to be poisonous and only used it to make sauces. 
By 1830, however, it was eaten generally. Small 
fruits were plentiful — cherries, pears, peaches, and 
apricots. The finer varieties of apples were cultivated 
in some orchards, but apples were eaten raw to a 
very limited extent. They were mixed with meat or 
boiled with cider to make apple-sauce, but they were 
raised chiefly for cider, and for this the small, knotty 
apples were supposed to be the best. Such berries as 
strawberries were so plentiful in the wild state that 
they were cultivated very little. The forests yielded 
a multitude of nuts, and the peanut was known, but 
had not yet become a product of systematic cultiva- 
tion. 

This was not the land of the gourmand. Fine 
cooking was a detail of life, and the Americans 
were indifferent to details. As in speaking they were 
careless of their grammar and only sought to make 
their meaning clear, so in eating they did not demand 
elegance in the cooking if the food itself was good. 

217 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

They were preoccupied with things which seemed to 
them more important than eating, and were unwilling 
to spend much time or thought upon the table. They 
ate quickly and only to live. The comfortable fat 
man with smooth flesh upon his bones, with round 
face and stomach — the product of leisurely apprecia- 
tion of the pleasures of the table — was a rare product. 
The typical American was a lean man. 

The cooking of the poor American was generally 
bad. His wife fried nearly everything, because it was 
the easiest and quickest way of cooking it. She made 
bread and pastry which were indigestible enough to 
ruin the character of the people. There was a limit 
to the harm she could inflict upon com meal and salt 
pork, however, and these were the chief articles of 
diet. Undoubtedly, the bad cooking was one of the 
causes that produced the cadaverous, shambling men 
and sour-faced, flat-breasted women who were met 
with at every turn of the road in the South and often 
enough in other parts of the country. It was one of 
the causes, too, of the habit of drinking rum or 
whisky. The liquor was used to satisfy an appetite 
which had been irritated by ill-cooked food. 

The professional cooks of the country were negroes, 
and the national cookery came from them. They were 
taught the art by their white mistresses, but they 
had a natural aptitude for it and made it their own. 
They liked the heat of the kitchen, and preferred the 
desultory labor of cooking to any other form of work. 
They were proud of the praise they received from 
their masters and mistresses when they performed 
it well. It gave them a position of importance in the 

218 



COOKS 

house and flattered their self-esteem. Their own 
pleasures were sensual, and they were very fond of 
eating, so they cooked with appreciation. While 
their cooking varied in the different sections of the 
country, in its general characteristics it was the same, 
and it was marked with the tropical origin of the 
cooks. The trained palate could tell if the food was 
cooked by a negro in New York as well as in Savannah. 
Probably the best cooking was in New Orleans, 
where the negroes had been taught by the French 
or Creole settlers; but traces of Creole cooking pene- 
trated to the North. The race of good negro cooks 
lasted until the rise of the second generation of negroes 
after the Civil War. It has now almost disappeared, 
because the free-bom negroes take no pride in domestic 
service and refuse to learn the art which their mothers 
in bondage practised with so much success. 

But it must not be supposed that the people who 
were rich enough to own or hire negro cooks were 
the only ones who lived well. On the farms in the 
well-settled portions of the country the prosperous 
and thrifty housewives were too intelligent to live 
uncomfortably, and epicures who had catholic tastes 
testified that their gastronomical experiences were 
agreeable when they enjoyed the hospitality of Amer- 
ican farm-houses. The most interesting tribute came 
from the greatest authority, Anthelme Brillat Savarin, 
a French statesman who fled from France at the time 
of the revolution and spent several years of his exile 
in the United States. He gave lessons in French at 
Hartford and played the violin in the orchestra of 
the Park Theater in New York. He returned to France 

219 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

in 1796 and became a judge of the court of cassation. 
He died in 1826, and his classic work, the Physiologie 
du Gout, was published after his death. It contains 
many pleasing allusions to the good eating he enjoyed 
when he lived in the United States. He described the 
abundant dinner he had at a farm-house in Connecti- 
cut — the superb piece of corned beef, the stewed 
goose, the magnificent leg of mutton, vegetables in 
plenty, and at each end of the table an enormous 
jug of excellent cider; and after dinner the daughters 
of the house prepared excellent tea. 

In a primeval forest near Hartford Brillat Savarin 
shot a large wild turkey, and the feast which followed 
the next day he set down as a noteworthy event in a 
life of gastronomical adventures. He declared that the 
turkey was "one of the most beautiful presents that 
the New World had made to the Old," and he called 
attention to the fact that while it had been domesti- 
cated in all the countries of Europe, in America alone 
was it found in a state of nature. It was, he said, 
the favorite food of all classes, and they were united 
by this preference. When the farmers wished to 
make a feast they chose for the principal dish a tur- 
key; so did the artisans and the workmen; so did 
the politicians and financiers. Dr. Johnson, WTiting 
his dictionary in 1755, defined a turkey as "a large 
domestick fowl supposed to come from Turkey," 
but the American origin of the fowl was generally 
known at a later day. It was plentiful enough in 
181 5 to be accessible to all but the poorest people. 

Equally accessible to everybody and equally prized 
by all classes of the population were the oysters, 

220 



COOKS 

which existed in the greatest profusion in the bays 
and rivers along the whole coast, but were thought 
to reach their perfection in Chesapeake Bay. Oyster- 
houses were common in the cities, where they were 
eaten raw on the shell. At Le Count's United States 
Refectory, at the corner of Fifth and Chestnut 
Streets, in Philadelphia, was a famous oyster-bar, 
presided over for many years by John Gardener, 
who opened so many oysters that he became an au- 
thority on their habits and printed the result of 
his observations in an amusing and instructive 
pamphlet. 

But the people were fond of other and less whole- 
some food than turkeys and oysters. There is an 
account of Mrs. Madison at breakfast at Monticello 
buttering her muffin carelessly and being told how 
she ought to do it by one of the young children 
at the table. Thus from childhood to old age the 
Southerners were eaters of hot bread; but the evil 
existed in all parts of the country. Buckwheat-cakes 
and flapjacks were eaten immoderately in the East, 
and hot rolls, muffins, and biscuits were on every 
breakfast-table in the South. There was a cheerful 
interchange of products between the sections, and 
buckwheat-cakes were in the South and hot rolls 
in the North. Foreigners generally commented un- 
favorably upon the habit of eating hot bread, and 
declared it was the cause of much of the ill health of 
the people. American physicians also advised against 
it; but admonition was in vain, and it has contin- 
ued without appreciable diminution to the present 
day. 

221 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

The custom of eating salted meat, especially pork, 
was not confined to America, but was more prevalent 
here than it was elsewhere. Nearly everybody in the 
country districts and many in the city regarded salt 
pork as the staff of life. The hogs were killed late 
in the autumn and their meat eaten every day in 
the year. Even to this day in certain sections of the 
cotmtry the word "meat" is commonly understood 
to mean pork. Probably the constant use of salted 
meat was another reason for the thirst of the people. 
Pork in the shape of hams was eaten by everybody, 
and a well-furnished dinner-table was considered to 
be incomplete without it. 

The custom of serving dinner in courses was not 
practised as we now practise it. Ordinarily, the whole 
dinner was on the table at the same time, but for a 
special feast there might be two courses of the same 
character and each a dinner in itself. The attractive- 
ness of the table depended upon the symmetrical 
arrangement of the dishes and upon their garnish- 
ment. There would be nine or ten large dishes upon 
the table, besides a number of smaller ones. The table- 
cloth would hardly be visible. An opulent man giv- 
ing a dinner-party would serve something like the 
following: for the first course, "cod's head," being the 
head and shoulders of a fresh codfish, a dish much 
esteemed at the time; pea -soup, venison, chickens 
roasted, boiled ham, beef collops, which corresponded 
with beefsteak; potatoes, celery, parsnips, jelly, pies, 
and marrow pudding. For the second course, turkey 
poults (^'■oung turkeys), scolloped oysters, roasted 
rabbits, wild ducks, lamb, smelts, haricot (usually 

222 



COOKS 

written "harrico," being a mutton ragout), several 
vegetables, cherry tarts, and stewed pippins. Then 
there would be brought in some ice-cream by itself. 
It was considered to be a great luxury, and it was 
eaten on rare occasions. The decanters of wine were 
distributed about the table. The servants placed the 
dishes on the table and changed the plates and 
knives and forks from time to time. The largest dishes 
of meat were carved by the host and hostess, and the 
person nearest a dish was expected to help his neigh- 
bors to it. Thus they all fed one another, and every- 
body was busy. The wine-drinking began early in 
the feast, and the people drank one another's health 
individually and collectively. After the second course 
the cloth was removed, the wine was replaced, fresh 
glasses were put on, and probably a fresh vintage, 
with nuts and fruit. The hostess then withdrew with 
the other ladies, if there were any; but the dinner- 
party was a pleasure generally reserved for men. 
Around the bare mahogany they drank lightly or 
heavily, as the case might be. At these dinners dis- 
cussions of importance often took place as the ma- 
deira or claret circulated, agreements for political ac- 
tion were reached, the fate of ambitious aspirants for 
public office was determined, financial projects were 
arranged. How many acts done in the cold light of 
day were the result of suggestion or encouragement 
coming from men who were warmed with wine and 
good feeding sitting at the dinner-table is beyond 
power of calculation. One illustration can be given, 
but similar instances could be multiplied. It was at a 
dinner-party given by Thomas Jefferson to Alexander 

223 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Hamilton in 1789 that an agreement was made by 
which the Capital of the United States was located 
upon the banks of the Potomac and the general gov- 
ernment assumed the debts of the states. It may be 
that those communities where dinner-giving was com- 
mon exerted greater influence upon national affairs 
than communities where the men seldom ate and 
drank together enjoyed. 

After the wine-drinking at a dinner-party the sur- 
viving guests went to the drawing-room and drank 
tea with their hostess. Coffee did not figure on these 
occasions, and it was not as generally drunk as it was 
at a later period. In fact, the consumption in the 
next thirty years increased by more than twelvefold. 
The tea-drinking or the uninterrupted wine-drinking 
might run into supper, in which case the party would 
not break up till eleven o'clock at night. The dinner 
having begun at three o'clock, which was a late hour 
even in the cities, there would have been about eight 
hours of continuous eating and drinking. At some 
tables an innovation in the courses was being adopted 
by serving the fish and soup as a first course by 
themselves, but nobody had yet thought of a dinner 
of eight or ten courses. Silver forks were used at the 
dinner-party, but for every-day purposes steel three- 
pronged forks were universal. As they did not hold 
some kinds of food very well, it was not considered 
inelegant to convey food from the plate to the mouth 
with the knife. 

Naturally, it was only a small proportion of the 
people who went to private dinner-parties, but the 
public had opportunities of accomplishing something 

224 



COOKS 

of the same result by attending the pubHc dinners 
which were given in the towns and villages and at- 
tended by people from the surrounding country. 
The reason, or the excuse, for holding them was to 
celebrate notable anniversaries or events or to do 
honor to public men. A great many were given on 
the 4th of July and the 2 2d of February, and there 
were a number in honor of the Treaty of Ghent. 
Often they were political gatherings designed to in- 
fluence public opinion. A local committee managed the 
feast and sold the tickets to any one who cared to pay 
for them. They cost about a dollar each, or perhaps 
more, some dinners being more expensive than others. 
The shopkeepers, proprietors, people of all classes 
except the laborers, attended them. It was easy 
enough to load the long tables with substantial food 
and with liquor, punch, and wine. If a band of music 
was obtainable it played before and during the dinner. 
Usually it could not play afterward. The local militia 
escorted the lion of the occasion in procession through 
the streets to the dinner. If there was a cannon avail- 
able it thundered salutes to persons and sentiments. 
The committee drew up a long list of toasts, to which 
were added by various guests what were called "vol- 
unteers." Most of the toasts were printed in the 
newspaper after the dinner, and they were supposed 
to show the trend of public sentiment. They aimed 
to be epigrammatical expressions of that sentiment. 
A few will serve to illustrate their general character. 
At the dinner given early in 181 5 to Commodore 
McDonough at Trap, New Castle Coimty, Delaware, 
near the place of his birth, one toast was: "The 

15 225 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

American character, as much caressed since, as it was 
despised before our late struggle — Honor to the brave 
men, both on the sea and land, who, at imminent 
risk of their lives, brought their country into notice 
and established its national character." 

At one given June 15, 181 5, at Fairfield, Vermont, 
to General Wooster : ' * The Constitution of the United 
States — the basis of our independence, the cement 
of our Union — ^may it be kept sacred and inviolable 
as the tables of stone in the Ark of the Covenant." 

At a dinner given to General William Henry Har- 
rison at Petersburg, Virginia, in March, 181 7: "The 
people — brave, patriotic, virtuous; free, sovereign, 
and independent. Four guns." 

"The American navy — the ocean and the lakes, 
the grand theaters of its glory. Two guns." 

"The Spanish patriots — contending for liberty. 
Whilst we sigh for their misforttmes we glory in their 
triumph. Two guns." 

There might be twenty toasts or more at a dinner, 
and a man who drank them all must have got very 
tipsy, but many of the diners did so independently 
of the toasts. In a former chapter we saw that the 
members of the first temperance society excepted 
public dinners from their agreement not to drink; 
and in another place, that the doctors said there was 
always an increase in the amount of sickness in a 
town after a public dinner. They were demoralizing 
assemblages. What with the music, the speechmak- 
ing, the hurrahing, the cannon-firing, and the drink- 
ing, there was excitement enough to tear the nerves 
of the participants asunder. The only thing that can 

226 



COOKS 

be said in their favor is that they brought men of 
different classes together on a plane of common 
interest and enabled them to know one another at 
their worst. The whisky-bottle is a rough promoter 
of democracy. 



XXIII 

DISCONTENT 

WHEREVER we travel through Christendom 
— in Europe, America, or elsewhere — we find 
great numbers of men, of all descriptions, very much 
dissatisfied with their condition, or, in other words, 
with the state of society with which they are con- 
nected." This true statement was in the introduction 
to a pamphlet published in London in 1789, entitled 
"A Plan for a Free Community upon the Coast of 
Africa . . . with an Invitation, under certain Con- 
ditions, to all Persons desirous of partaking the 
Benefits thereof." It was signed by two men from 
Sweden, one from Prussia, and one American; but 
their names are unimportant, for they are now un- 
known to fame. That dissatisfaction was prevalent 
in Europe was true, but the dissatisfied element in 
America was small. There was really nothing to 
cause dissatisfaction. There was no social injustice. 
One class was not exploited by another class — in fact, 
there was no such word as exploitation. There was 
no privileged class. If a man had the elements of 
success in him he succeeded. There were individuals 
who complained because they were unfortunate, and 
there were others who looked for perfection in human 
affairs and attributed its absence to a false constitution 

228 



DISCONTENT 

of society. These were only individuals; they con- 
stituted no group of the population. 

The foundation of the national prosperity was the 
land, and good land was abundant. Under the law 
the national lands were sold for two dollars per acre. 
One-twentieth of the purchase price must be depos- 
ited to pay costs of survey and registration, which 
amounted to $ii.oo; one-fourth of the total price 
must be paid in forty days; one-half in two years; 
three-fourths in three years, and the whole in four 
years. The immediate capital necessary to obtain 
640 acres was not more than $331. An able-bodied 
man of good reputation could borrow it. Later the 
price was reduced to $1.25 per acre, and various laws 
were passed by which a settler could, tmder certain 
conditions, obtain land for nothing. Besides these 
national lands were the great tracts held by several of 
the states and by individuals, parcels of which could 
be bought on terms so easy that they were accessible 
to everybody. There was a great deal of speculation 
in land, but the speculators themselves, demoralizing 
as their influence was, were active in obtaining set- 
tlers for the new land by selling it to them. The 
farming was done, as it had been done for hundreds 
of years — with the plow, the horse, and by hand. 
There were no important inventions in agriculture 
till 183 1, when McCormick made his reaper and 
Manning his mowing-machine. To be a farmer on 
an equality with other farmers required little capital. 

The rich men of the country had not yet become a 
power to excite general alarm. They, too, were only 
individuals. The largest fortunes were made in 

229 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

shipping. The adventurer sent American products 
abroad in his own ships and exchanged them for 
foreign products which he brought home and sold 
at an enormous profit. It was a simple and direct 
form of commerce, which did not carry with it the 
idea that the individual was enriching himself by 
the labor of others. One of these shippers was Israel 
Thomdike, of Boston, who died in 1832, leaving a 
fortune of more than two million dollars. He was 
described as the richest man in New England. Will- 
iam Bingham, who died in 1804, had been perhaps 
the richest man in America. He owned two million 
acres of land in Maine, and the largest house in Phila- 
delphia, but the basis of his fortune was laid in the 
West Indian trade. The shippers sent their vessels 
into every sea — to Turkey, China, and East India 
as well as Europe and the West Indies. Stephen 
Girard, in Philadelphia, had amassed a great fortime. 
He died in 1831, leaving nine million dollars. He was 
a banker, but his wealth began in shipping. John 
Jacob Astor, in New York, was an exception to the 
rule that the great fortunes came from shipping. 
He became rich as a fur-trader and was already buying 
large tracts of land in the city and contiguous to it. 
His was the only great fortune of the day which 
has survived to the present time. Individual for- 
tunes were rising in New York, but a man who had 
one hundred thousand dollars was among the few who 
were called very rich. There were not five millionaires 
in the city. Exclusive of the United States bank, 
there were eleven banks in New York and ten in 
Philadelphia. Six of the New York banks and four 

230 



DISCONTENT 

of those in Philadelphia had a capital of over one mill- 
ion dollars. There were some rich bankers, but 
their wealth was uncertain, for this was the period 
of state bank-making. Between 1812 and 181 7 there 
were three times as many of them as there had been 
in previous years, and an enormous increase in the 
volume of circulating bank-notes. All the banks ex- 
cept those in New England suspended specie payments 
in 1 8 14 and bank-notes fell in value. The result was 
in 18 19 the first great financial panic in the country, 
many business failures and much distress. An effect 
of the speculation and the bank failures was to create 
a popular prejudice against banks in general, which 
bore fruit some years later when General Jackson 
was President and fought the Bank of the United 
States. 

Along the Hudson River and in the central part 
of New York were a few large landholders, whose 
ancestors had obtained their lands by Dutch grants, 
and who had let them out on a sort of feudal tenure. 
After the Revolution they retained the ownership and 
obtained some state lands as well, and had tenant 
farmers. The injustice of paying rent to proprietors 
who had no part in developing the land caused serious 
discontent among the tenants, which finally culmi- 
nated in 1 841 in an attempted revolution which 
became known as the anti-rent war. The condition 
was local and is an interesting illustration of the fact 
that where injustice prevailed discontent took form. 
It was an exception to the rule that the land was cul- 
tivated by those who owned it. The great tracts of 
wild lands held for speculative purposes were not 

231 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

farmed at all, until they were sold to cultivators. 
As a matter of fact, they were not needed. 

After the land the wealth of the country was chiefly 
in two items, shipping and slaves, each being com- 
puted as worth two hundred and twenty-five million 
dollars. 

The planters of the South were rich men — that is 
to say, they had the attributes of wealth in the 
form of servants, horses, large houses, abundance of 
food, and fine clothes. They traveled occasionally 
and sent their children to the best schools. They 
were capitalized at a large sum, because their slaves 
were very valuable, being worth from one hundred and 
fifty to fifteen hundred dollars each. So a man who 
had fifty slaves and a thousand acres of land woiild 
be worth some forty thousand dollars, a respectable 
fortune. But he had no stocks or bonds or money 
out at interest. On the contrary, he was apt to be 
paying interest, for he was often in debt. He lived 
by the labor of others. He exploited a lower class 
of men whom he kept in bondage. He was privi- 
leged. The system of society in which he lived was 
built upon palpable social injustice. The observa- 
tions which have been made here about the absence 
of a basis for a discontented class in the United States 
do not apply to the South. There the voice of dis- 
content was suppressed, but there the discontent 
was deep and serious. We should look to find from 
these conditions projects for reform, and we do not 
look in vain. 

There were many plans for freeing the slaves. 
To use the proceeds of the sale of public land to buy 

232 



DISCONTENT 

them from their owners; to emancipate all who 
should be bom after a certain date; to allow them 
to buy their own freedom by their labor — these and 
many other projects were put forward with the best 
intentions. The chief argument against them was 
that they made no provision for removing the blacks 
after they were free, and the conviction was general 
that a large population of free negroes could not 
safely exist in the same country with a white popu- 
lation. From this conviction came the plans for 
sending the freedmen back to the continent from 
which they had been stolen. These projects were 
the noble fruit from an evil soil. Their object was 
to encourage emancipation which should come from 
philanthropic motives, by showing slaveholders a 
happy and prosperous state composed of black citi- 
zens in Africa. The free blacks, too, whose position 
in the United States was always uncertain and often 
deplorable, would be free in fact, and would have 
opportimity to develop all that was good in them — 
an opportunity which they could not have as long 
as they lived in the United States. Finally, there 
were the Africans themselves, sunk in savagery, igno- 
rance, and superstition. The American blacks, free, 
Christianized, and with some education, would be as 
missionaries among them, and would lead them out 
of their mental and moral darkness into the light of 
Christianity and knowledge. 

The first efforts at colonizing American negroes 
in Africa were made in England, where certain Eng- 
lish philanthropists, under the lead of Granville 
Sharp, planned to send the negroes who had escaped 

233 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

to English jurisdiction during the Revolution to 
Sierra Leone. They had been sent to England, 
where they were a public charge and a demoralized 
and useless part of the population. A strip of terri- 
tory on the West Coast of Africa was bought for 
them, and arrangements were made to send them there. 
Many of them refused to go; many ran away, and the 
ships for Sierra Leone finally sailed with less than 
seven hundred colonists, only about a third of the 
number for whom the colony had been planned. 
From various causes, the basis of which was the 
incapacity of the colonists and the perfidy of the 
agents who were in charge of the enterprise, the 
scheme failed. Some of the colonists were killed by 
the natives, many died of disease, and only a remnant 
was left to drag out a miserable existence in a miser- 
able land. 

Nevertheless, certain American emancipationists 
thought the experiment might be tried with better 
prospects of success tmder other conditions ; and John 
Jay, who was always an emancipationist, and the Rev. 
Samuel Hopkins, of Rhode Island, who had proposed 
colonization of free negroes in Africa as early as 
i773> wrote to Sharp on the subject. He replied dis- 
couragingly, but William Thornton, who also wrote 
to him, would not accept discouragement. Thornton 
had recently chosen the United States for his home 
and wished to free the large number of slaves he had 
on his plantation in the Island of Tortola, one of 
the Virgin Isles in the West Indies. He was reared 
a Quaker, although he left that persuasion when he 
married a Philadelphian who was an Episcopalian. 

234 



DISCONTENT 

Of soaring ambition and daring thought, young and 
enthusiastic, he burned with a desire to do some act 
which would elevate humanity and make his name 
immortal. He thought the English colony had failed 
for reasons which he could remedy. For one thing, 
the colonists were helpless because they had been 
freed too suddenly. He would have them obtain their 
freedom by their own exertions and become gradually 
accustomed to relying upon themselves. Moreover, 
the freedmen's new home must be an independency. 
They must erect a new nation. He interested his 
friend Brissot de Warville in Paris in the plan, and 
Brissot brought in other Frenchmen. Thornton in- 
tended to go with the colonists himself, and, doubtless, 
had visions of being the head of the new nation and 
carrying out some of the many plans for a great 
state which grew in his fertile brain. His work 
extended from 1786 to 1791, during which time he 
traveled in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, and 
also made addresses on the subject of colonization in 
Pennsylvania. About two thousand freed negroes 
in New England expressed a willingness to go to 
Sierra Leone. Thornton hoped that the legislature 
of Massachusetts would send them, but when he 
approached some of the members he found they were 
unwilling to transport the negroes so far. They pro- 
posed, instead, to send them to the most southern 
part of the public lands of the United States, between 
the white settlements and the Indian country. To 
this Thornton would not agree. Thus situated, he 
said, they would be exposed to massacre by the In- 
dians ; and, moreover, if a black territory were estab- 

235 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

lished in the United States the inhabitants would 
never be given political rights. So the scheme fell 
through, and his restless mind turned to another 
subject — the building of a great city upon the banks 
of the Potomac for the capital of the American 
nation. He proposed at a later day the purchase of 
negro slaves by the government and their employ- 
ment upon public works pending their emancipation, 
and that the island of Porto Rico should be bought 
from Spain and made a home for them. The public 
mind was ready for none of these things, and the 
idea of negro colonization slumbered for twenty-five 
years, when it was awakened under greater promise 
of success than it had ever had before. 

On December 21, 18 16, the American Colonization 
Society was formed at a meeting in Washington over 
which Henry Clay presided. The first president was 
Bushrod Washington, a judge of the Supreme Court, 
the nephew of General Washington, and the owner 
of Mt. Vernon. Most of the members were slave- 
holders who lived in the hope of finding a practicable 
way of accomplishing emancipation. Money was 
raised by popular subscription and bequests. The 
government gave its patronage to the plan and 
appropriated one hundred thousand dollars to send 
the freedmen to the country which the society 
selected for them. The scheme at first took on the 
appearance of a popular movement. The eagerness 
with which enlightened Southerners embraced it 
shows how earnestly they wished to rid themselves 
of the incubus of slavery. Opposition to the society 
developed in a few parts of the South, however, 

236 



DISCONTENT 

where it was looked upon as hurtful to the pecuniary 
interests of the planters and slave-dealers. It de- 
pended for its income too much upon voluntary 
donations. Church collections and the proceeds of 
ladies' fairs were a part of its resources, and a very 
uncertain part. It required a large and assiu-ed in- 
come to carry out the tremendous purpose it was 
designed to accomplish, and it did not have it. From 
the beginning the society fell too much into the hands 
of clergymen. They had the missionary project of 
converting the Africans too much in their minds. 
Practical men cared nothing for the souls of the 
Africans; they were concerned with the hideous evil 
which existed at home, and they doubted the effi- 
ciency of a society which clergymen were managing. 
The freed blacks themselves showed no eagerness to 
go to Africa, and they could not be compelled to go. 
After. all, the society was a very small organization 
to grapple with a very large problem. If everything 
went well with it the results would still be hardly 
noticeable in a population of more than a million 
blacks. It staggers the imagination to suppose that 
the leaders of the society should have expected to es- 
tablish a prosperous commimity in such a place as that 
which they chose for settlement. One of the agents 
whom they sent to report on it died of the fever. 
The climate was hopelessly enervating to those whom 
it did not kill outright. Nevertheless, a few thousand 
misguided American negroes went from time to time 
to the new land, and finally established the republic 
of Liberia, an independent nation, under the protec- 
tion of the United States, probably the least important 

237 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

country in the world, the feeble child of a devoted 
and wholly futile effort to free the country from the 
worst evil that has ever afflicted it. Hardly any 
slaves were emancipated in order that they might 
emigrate. Nevertheless, the Colonization Society was 
talked about long after it ceased to deserve notice. 
It exists even now and administers a small income 
which yet belongs to it, and now and then sends a 
few American negroes to join their unhappy brothers 
in Africa. 



XXIV 

EXCRESCENCES 

THE efforts for the betterment of the American 
blacks were a legitimate outcome of American 
conditions, but there were certain communities in the 
country established for the betterment of their own 
members which had no such basis. These communi- 
ties were not indigenous; all were imported. 

The Shakers are the oldest, and there are still about 
one thousand of them left in fifteen societies in New 
York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, Con- 
necticut, Ohio, and Kentucky. The membership is 
diminishing, and their total disappearance is only a 
matter of time. It is remarkable that they have held 
together for so long. In 1815 the sect had reached 
its greatest prosperity and numbered some five thou- 
sand people. The founder was an ignorant English 
working- woman, Ann Lee, who came to New York 
from Manchester in 1774 with two women and six 
men who believed her to be the "Mother in Christ" 
and called her "Mother Ann." She worked as a 
washerwoman for two years, when she and her little 
band formed a community at Watervliet near Albany. 
In England she had been persecuted for her religious 
pretensions, and in this country she was imprisoned 
on the charge of being a British spy in 1776, but was 

239 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

pardoned by Governor Clinton the following year 
and thereafter suffered no molestation from the law. 
At different times, however, there was some popular 
animosity toward her followers, and they were har- 
assed by mobs on several occasions. The recruits who 
joined her sect were the products of the frequent 
religious revivals. At a revival which took place at 
Mt. Lebanon, Columbia County, New York, in 1780, 
a number of the participants joined Mother Ann's per- 
suasion and founded a community at that place, which 
became the parent of the other societies. In 1781 she 
made a missionary journey through New England and 
several communities were started. Her death in 1784 
had no effect on the progress of Shakerism, and fol- 
lowing the great revival in Kentucky in 1805 villages 
were established in that state, Indiana, and Ohio. 
One pledge which the brethren and sisters took said, 
among other things: 

"We do by these presents covenant and agree to re- 
nounce and disannul every band, tie, and relation of the 
flesh and to hold ourselves free and separate from all that 
pertains to the corrupt generation of fallen men," etc. 

The Shakers believe that Christ appeared on earth 
for the second time in the person of Ann Lee, and 
that they are enabled by their faith to "take up a 
full and daily cross against the world, the flesh, and 
all evil" and "to follow Christ in the regeneration 
by which they believe God according to His everlast- 
ing promise will gather together in one all things in 
Christ which are in heaven and upon earth." They 
are loyal to their country and declare that their 
belief is perfectly consistent with civil rights. They 

240 



EXCRESCENCES 

believe in liberty of conscience and "that all souls 
whom God has created are free and have a right to 
believe according to their own conviction and to act 
according to their own faith." They are non-com- 
batants, however, and regard military service as 
sinful. They beHeve in celibacy for themselves, but 
have no objection to marriage among people who are 
not of their elect. They require their members to 
confess their sins to an elder. They believe they 
must live separated from the world and holding their 
property in common. They are spiritualists, and 
Mother Ann and other departed shades often appear 
at their meetings. Mother Ann herself claimed the 
power of divine healing of the sick, and, according to 
the testimony, effected several miraculous cures. At 
their meetings there is singing, dancing, marching, 
and whirling, besides exhortation and prayer. A 
great many of them have reached a stage where 
their lives have become sinless. Originally professing 
the Quaker creed, they were known as "Shaking 
Quakers," but they soon became a distinct sect and 
accepted the designation of Shakers. Their civil 
and religious government are in the same persons, 
deacons and deaconnesses, and elders and eldresses, 
who appoint their own successors. The women and 
the men are upon a perfect equality. They are careful 
to keep the sexes apart, however. Everything is 
ordered with rigid regularity. The meals are eaten 
in silence, the men and women at separate tables, and 
no amusements are permitted. As everybody works 
and the strictest economy prevails, they have attained 
material prosperity. The fact that they are abso- 
16 241 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

lutely honest in their deahngs and thorough in their 
work is an additional reason for this. The regularity 
of their Uves has produced some notable cases of 
longevity among them. These figures were given by 
one of them for the communities of Hancock, Massa- 
chusetts, and Mt. Lebanon, but the last figure seems 
incredible: Fifty- three of the members Hved to be 
more than ninety years old, of whom thirteen died 
when they were more than ninety-five, four when 
they were over one hundred, and one after he had 
Hved for one hundred and twenty years. I have 
seen a great many of their hymns, prayers, and 
narratives of experiences. They show the perfect 
self-confidence and strength of conviction of ignorant 
minds. They do not show weakness of intellects, but 
narrowness. Those who came after Mother Ann 
were better educated than she was; in fact, she could 
neither read nor write; but there have never been 
any cultivated people among the Shakers. While 
the Shakers were English in their origin, their mem- 
bership was drawn mainly from Americans, but 
there was always a fair proportion of foreigners. 

The Harmony Society, which is the next oldest 
community in the United States, was foreign in its 
origin and always remained so in all essentials. The 
members did not vote, although they were naturalized 
as American citizens, and their recruits came from 
Germany. They used the German language. George 
Rapp, the founder and guiding spirit of the com- 
munity, was of a far higher grade of intelligence than 
Mother Ann. He was better educated, less preten- 
tious, and his creed and conduct were less unreason- 

242 



EXCRESCENCES 

able. He claimed no divine origin or power, and he 
did not believe in spiritualism. He fled from Wurt- 
temberg, where he was bom, because he and his 
followers were persecuted for practising their re- 
ligion. With three hundred families, constituting 
seven hundred and fifty men, women, and children, 
he built the town of Harmony in Butler County, 
Pennsylvania, in 1805, but the soil and climate did 
not suit them, and in 18 14 they moved to the val- 
ley of the Wabash in Indiana, where they built a 
second Harmony. In 1825 they moved again, to 
Beaver County, Pennsylvania, where they built the 
town of Economy, and where the remnant of the 
sect, now not a dozen members, still resides. The 
community was industrious and honest, its indus- 
tries were diversified, and it became very rich. 
George Rapp died in 1847, when he was ninety 
years old, and the Harmonists drifted on without 
the master gmding hand. Originally they were not 
celibates; but in 1807 they decided that marriage 
distracted people from higher duties and was not 
consonant with their belief in the original dual 
nature of Adam, and there were no more mar- 
riages among them. The cardinal point in their 
creed was that the second coming of Christ was 
near at hand, when the millennium would come and 
the earth would be like the Garden of Eden before 
the fall of Adam. The great object of life, therefore, 
was to be ready for the reappearance of Christ, and 
Rapp expected to present his followers as worthy of 
divine favor. The communistic mode of life they 
thought was a command of Christ. 

243 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

In 1818 another band of persecuted Germans came 
to America from Wurttemberg. They settled in Tus- 
caroras County, Ohio, where they founded a village 
which they called Zoar, after the little city in which 
Lot found refuge when Sodom and Gomorrah were 
destroyed. At first they were not communists, but, 
finding it difficult to hold the members of their sect 
together because of their uneven fortunes, they 
adopted communism as a convenience. They were 
celibates till 1828 or 1830, when they permitted 
marriage, but they never encouraged it. Like the 
followers of Rapp, they came to escape religious 
persecution, and they proselyted only in Germany. 
They prospered fairly well, but they did not have 
as great cohesive force as the Harmonists or Shakers, 
because their creed was much milder. They did not 
have as able a leader as Rapp. They called them- 
selves Separatists, and merely disapproved of the 
forms and ceremonies of the established church of 
Germany. True Christian life, they said, requires no 
set forms and ceremonies. They were opposed to 
military service. They retained the rules which they 
made in Germany, which were applicable there and 
had no application here. They had a simple govern- 
ment, the officers being elected by majority vote, 
the women having a vote equally with the men. 
Their religious meetings were held only on Sundays 
and all the people did not attend them. They were 
of the German peasant class, and they did not pro- 
gress beyond it. There were never more than five 
hundred members of the community. It decreased 
and passed out of existence in 1898. 

244 



EXCRESCENCES 

When George Rapp and his followers left their land 
and buildings in Indiana they sold them for one hun- 
dred thousand dollars to Robert Owen, of Lanark, 
who thus acquired, ready made as it were, the plant 
for a more important social experiment than Rapp's; 
but Owen's experiment was inspired by an entirely 
different purpose from Rapp's and belongs to a dif- 
ferent period. It marks, in fact, the beginning of 
socialism in the United States. It was the outcome 
of the factory system. It was an effort to overcome 
the injustice of employing large bodies of men to 
create wealth and of not permitting them to receive 
a fair proportion of the wealth which they created. 
It was not directed to their spiritual welfare; on the 
contrary, it tended to concentrate their attention 
upon their material well being. It has its place in the 
economic history of the United States under condi- 
tions which did not exist at the time of which I am 
writing, when there were no large American facto- 
ries. 

In 1 8 13 Owen wrote his essay on "A New View of 
Society," and it found its way to America where a 
few idealists welcomed it. In a former chapter I 
spoke of the New York Society for the Prevention 
of Pauperism. It was a practical charitable organiza- 
tion which dealt with poverty under existing condi- 
tions; but another society was formed about 1820 
entitled ' ' The New York Society for Promoting Com- 
munities," the organizers being four ministers, one 
attorney, five physicians and surgeons, a printer, 
three teachers, a merchant, a builder, and one whose 
occupation was not stated. It had as its object to 

245 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

"convince the pious of all denominations that their 
duty is to constitute and establish in every religious 
congregation a system of social, equal, and inclusive 
rights, interests, liberties, and privileges to all real 
and personal property" which would cause "self-love 
to expire in social love" and introduce the gospel 
of peace on earth and good will to men; and "when 
the inclusive system became general the present gov- 
ernment of exclusive rights and properties would be 
supplanted by the government of Jehovah and his 
annointed, the Prince of Peace." It said: "The 
heartrending statements which were made known 
during the discussions of negro slavery do not exhibit 
more afflicting scenes than those which, in various 
parts of the world, daily arise from the injustice of 
society toward itself." So this society intended to 
abolish poverty, crime, and injustice. I cannot find 
that it got any adherents or founded any commimi- 
ties. It printed extracts from Owen's "New View of 
Society," all unconscious that Owen was an infidel 
and would soon proclaim the fact. 

The three communities, the Shakers, the Harmo- 
nites, and the Separatists, were the only ones in the 
United States one hundred years ago, and they were 
mere excrescences on our national life, superficial 
appendages without organic significance. They ex- 
cited little attention at the time and made no im- 
pression on the normal progress of the nation. A 
few people under strong religious excitement found 
among the Shakers conditions which enabled them 
to continue their exaltation; but in Harmony and 
Zoar there was nothing to attract them. There were 

246 



EXCRESCENCES 

reasons why Mother Ann and Rapp and the Separa- 
tists should have come to America; they were perse- 
cuted in Europe; but there was no reason beyond 
their own preference for their living in separate com- 
munities in this country. 



XXV 

THE GOVERNMENT 

EXCEPT for the few groups of communists who 
lived by themselves all the people in the United 
States in 1815 took a personal interest in the political 
affairs of the country. They were busy making a 
living, but they were not so engrossed by their in- 
dustry that it excluded the government from their 
thoughts. They were still considering the nature of 
that government. They knew that it was not a 
democracy, and the utmost lengths to which those 
who wished it to be a government of the people, and 
argued that it was, cared to go was to call it a demo- 
cratic republic. Everybody believed in representa- 
tive government. The governors of eight of the 
eighteen states were elected by the legislatures, and 
not by the people directly. It was considered to be 
enough that the people should directly elect their 
Representatives in Congress and their local officers. 
The legislatures had chosen the delegates to the Con- 
tinental Congress and the delegates to the conven- 
tion which framed the Constitution. The Constitu- 
tion itself was not ratified by a vote of the people, but 
by conventions of delegates whom the people had 
selected to decide for them whether or not it should 
be accepted. The people still believed that the elec- 

248 



THE GOVERNMENT 

toral college chose the President. No voice was 
raised to demand a direct election by popular vote of 
Senators. No one proposed that the people should 
vote directly on proposed legislation. 

Nevertheless, this was understood to be a govern- 
ment of public opinion, and it was generally agreed 
that no important measure should become law until 
it had been publicly discussed and a sentiment for it 
had been manifested. It was not generally believed 
that a count of heads was the best way to ascertain 
what the public sentiment was. Universal manhood 
suffrage was being experimented with, but was not 
yet accepted as a safe basis of government. In twelve 
of the states voting was conditioned upon ownership 
of real property or payment of taxes. 

The electors felt the responsibility of their power 
and had a good understanding of public affairs. 
They read pamphlets and articles, and Hstened to 
speeches on pending political questions which were 
thorough and even erudite discussions. The natiu^e 
of the information which those who understood the 
voters put before them shows that their intelligence 
was held in respect. This is not to say, however, 
that the demagogue was not busy with them. If 
a country is governed by an individual there will 
be people near him who will try to influence him 
to their advantage by flattering him and playing 
upon his weaknesses. If the people govern there 
will always be designing men who will try to use 
them by arousing their passions and making them 
false promises. It would seem that courtiers who 
deceive the monarch and demagogues who deceive 

249 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

the masses are the worst forms of an evil which 
afflicts all governments. In 1815 the United States 
was governed by the middle class, who were not easily- 
worked upon by tricks and lies. There was no power- 
ful moneyed class, and there were no great groups of 
ignorant voters such as now cluster in the large 
cities. Unless the surviving evidence — the books, the 
published debates in Congress and the state legis- 
latures, the pamphlets, newspaper articles, and private 
letters — is wholly misleading, demagogic appeals to 
the governing power were not a conspicuous feature 
of political life one hundred years ago. 

Public opinion was forming steadily in the direction 
of the belief that the United States was a nation, but 
it had not yet formed in that belief. It was common 
to speak of "the Nation," because there was no other 
word to describe the country as a whole, but it was 
not considered to be a nation for domestic purposes. 
Against a foreign country the states stood as one 
power ; but at home the country was thought to be an 
aggregation of political entities, each of which had 
most of the attributes of sovereignty and might as- 
sume them all. They had volimtarily given certain 
sovereignty to the federal government, and were free 
to recall it. National laws were drawing the bands 
tighter, and each year the union became more and 
more difficult to break, but the right to break it 
existed, as most of them believed. 

In 1794 Oliver Ellsworth, of Connecticut, and Rufus 
King, of New York, had an interesting private con- 
versation with John Taylor of Caroline, of Virginia, 
all three being Senators at the time. King and Ells- 

250 



THE GOVERNMENT 

worth proposed that there be an amicable dissolution 
of the Union, because the sections could not agree on 
any government measure ; but Taylor would not con- 
sent, and thought the differences could be accom- 
modated. He reported the conversation to Madison, 
who was then the leader of the House, and Madison 
was disposed to think that King and Ellsworth had 
been trying to frighten Taylor; but this point is not 
important to our inquiry. They would not have made 
a treasonable and unpatriotic suggestion for strategi- 
cal purposes. They did not consider their suggestion 
to be either treasonable or unpatriotic; nor did Tay- 
lor and Madison so consider it. So far as their atti- 
tude toward the Union was concerned there was Ao 
real difference between the opposing parties at this 
time. The party which was in power wished to con- 
tinue the union ; the party which was in the opposition 
threatened it. In the first Congress both parties 
would have dissolved it under a little pressure. 
Business came to a standstill, and there seemed to 
be no object in Congress meeting, because the South 
could not get the North to agree to locate the capital 
in the South, and the North could not get the South 
to agree that the general government must assume 
the war debts of the several states. Having weathered 
this storm, the Federalists began to think of disimion 
a few years later, as we have just seen. The exciting 
cause of their dissatisfaction was that the opposition 
Senators opposed the confirmation of John Jay as 
Minister to England, and favored a sequestration of 
British debts, because Great Britain had not paid for 
the slaves she had carried off during the Revolution. 

251 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

There was no vital issue at stake between the parties, 
and no serious injury to the rights of either could have 
come from the success of the other. When the Feder- 
alists passed the Alien and Sedition laws it was the 
turn of the Republicans to talk of disunion, and plans 
were discussed, especially in Virginia and North Caro- 
lina. In 1811, when Louisiana was about to be ad- 
mitted as a state, a Federalist, Josiah Quincy, of Mass- 
achusetts, threatened disunion in the course of the de- 
bate in the House of Representatives. The ground of 
complaint was that the new territory was so large that 
it would dwarf the old states. That the nation would 
gain prestige was of no consequence alongside of the 
fact that Massachusetts would lose it. Again the 
Federalists threatened disunion, and seriously con- 
sidered it because of the hardship inflicted by the 
commercial restrictions imposed before and during 
the War of 181 2. The hardship was real, and the 
opposition to the measures was excusable. To pur- 
sue the subject further: in 1832 the Republicans of 
South Carolina threatened disunion, because they 
thought the tariff weighed heavily upon them. The 
disturbance was local, and the union sentiment had 
attained such force that the country accepted Andrew 
Jackson's argument in his proclamation addressed to 
the nullifiers that an overt act of disunion was trea- 
son. Thus the march had gone forward — from toler- 
ance of the union, to general consent to it, to intoler- 
ance of opposition to it, to denial of the right to with- 
draw from it. In 18 1 5 public opinion had reached 
the third stage and regarded disunion sentiments with 
intolerance. Because of their attitude toward the 

252 



THE GOVERNMENT 

Union the members of the Hartford Convention and 
their friends became marked men and lost their 
national influence. From now on devotion to the 
Union and the Constitution deepened into affection 
and became synonymous with patriotism. 

One reason for this forward movement was that a 
regular and simple way had been found to prevent the 
Constitution from being violated, and that this way 
was now generally understood. It was clear that 
until there was a way by which the government could 
protect itself from violations such violations were 
likely to be met by withdrawal. 

Suppose that a majority in Congress, being of the 
same party with the President, chooses to pass un- 
constitutional and oppressive measures; what is to 
prevent it? In truth, there is nothing to prevent it; 
and if the President signs them they become law. 
But is there no way of arresting the operation of such 
laws? Any one would answer promptly, "Yes, the 
Supreme Court will declare them void." In 1798, 
however, few people would have made that answer, 
and in that year Congress passed despotic measures 
dangerous to liberty and believed by a great part of 
the people to be palpably unconstitutional; and the 
President signed them, and they became laws. They 
decreed that the President could send out of the 
United States any alien whom he might consider to 
be dangerous to the public peace and safety. There 
was no appeal. He could have sent away all the aliens 
whom he did not like under the pretense that their 
presence was harmful to public tranquillity. The ob- 
ject of the law was not to prevent paupers, criminals, 

253 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

diseased persons, and members of an obnoxious race 
from settling in the United States, but to provide the 
President with the means of suppressing the voice of 
antagonism to the measures of his poHtical party, some 
of that antagonism having come from aUens who had 
recently settled in the United States. At the same 
session of Congress another law was passed requiring an 
alien to Hve in the United States for at least fourteen 
years before he could be naturahzed as a citizen. 
The object of this law was to keep aliens within the 
power of the law, permitting their expulsion as long 
as possible. Then a law was passed inflicting fine 
and imprisonment upon any one who should utter 
in speech or in print scandalous or insulting lan- 
guage against the government or its officers. Free 
speech and a free press could be silenced by this 
law. 

Where was relief from the operation of these laws 
to be sought? The Supreme Court did not then 
command, nor did it deserve, general confidence. The 
Chief Justice was OHver Ellsworth, who had, while 
still Chief Justice, been sent on a mission to France, 
when the office was essentially a political one. The 
judges were Samuel Chase, an avowed violent Feder- 
alist partisan; Iredell, Cushing, and Paterson, all 
known to be strong Federalists. It is beyond doubt 
that the court, if the laws had been brought before 
it, woiild have upheld them. Thus far, in fact, it had 
never declared an act of Congress which did not affect 
the judiciary to be unconstitutional. It was a semi- 
political body, and politicians, as the historian of the 
court states, "bivouacked in the chief -justiceship on 

254 



THE GOVERNMENT 

their march from one poHtical position to another." 
If the court had upheld the laws one party would 
have murmured against the decision. If, on the 
other hand, it had declared them void the other party 
would not have accepted the decision. In fact, pub- 
lic opinion would not have supported the court. It 
is fortunate that the authority was not then subjected 
to a strain which might have destroyed its future use- 
fulness. So, eliminating the court, the opponents of 
the laws, by resolutions adopted by the legislatures 
of Virginia and Kentucky, proposed a complicated and 
impracticable method of meeting violations of the 
Constitution. As the states, they said, had ratified 
the Constitution, it was their creation, and they had 
power over it. Consequently, when an obnoxious, 
oppressive, and unconstitutional law was passed the 
states coiild arrest its operations within their respec- 
tive borders. To this proposition all the New Eng- 
land states, New York, and Delaware replied in dis- 
sent; but the rest of the country probably agreed to 
it. In 1 814 New England put forward the same doc- 
trine, and no state replied to it. There was general 
apathy toward the theory, because a power had been 
developed in which all had confidence, which would 
guard the fundamental law from violation. In 1803 
John Marshall, the Chief Justice, handed down the 
decision of the Supreme Court in which it asserted 
for the first time that it was the right and duty of 
the coiurt to pass upon the constitutionality of acts 
of Congress, and if they were unconstitutional to 
declare them void. It is true that the framers of 
the Constitution had always believed that the court 

255 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

had this power, but they had no idea how its exercise 
would operate. Here, as in all government affairs, 
the personal element entered as an important factor. 
The court of John Marshall and his associates, among 
whom were now several jurists who had no political 
record, could do with safety what Oliver Ellsworth 
and his partisan associates would have done with 
peril. 

By 1815 the fimctlons of the several branches of 
the government were understood, but the second 
chamber of Congress, the Senate, was looked upon 
as of less importance than it became in the public 
view at a later day. For this fact it had itself to 
thank. Had the first sessions been open to the pub- 
lic, as the sessions of the House were, it would have 
had public influence equal or superior to that of the 
House. It was supposed that it would occupy high 
position in the new government, and at first the ablest 
characters sought admission to it. The first Senate 
was a strong body in its personnel. Oliver Ellsworth, 
George Read, Charles Carroll, William Paterson, 
Robert Morris, Rufus King, Richard Henry Lee, and 
James Monroe were among the members. But it 
held its sessions in secret, so that it might not be in- 
fluenced by public censure or favor. In consequence, 
it could not exert public influence itself. It exercised 
its power imtrammeled, but it deprived itself of power. 
Wise action taken in secret and eloquent speeches 
which nobody heard were wasted. The public, being 
ignorant of what it was doing, became indifferent to 
it or perhaps suspicious of it. Thus the impression 
at the beginning of the operation of the government 

256 



THE GOVERNMENT 

was not favorable to the Senate ; and, being a neglected 
or even unpopular body, there was no eagerness to 
serve in it, and the membership fell off in quality. 
John Vining took George Read's place; John Henry, 
Charles Carroll's; William Bingham that of Robert 
Morris; and so on. On February 20, 1794, the Senate 
opened its doors to the public, but it took some years 
to overcome the popular indifference which had come 
in the beginning. In 18 15 it held very few members 
who were of the first rank of public men. Henry Clay 
had been in the Senate from 1806 to 1807, and again 
for a year from February 5, 18 10, to March 3, 181 1, 
when he resigned to go into the House, because from 
the House he could lead the country. For the next 
ten years the obscurity of the Senate continued; but 
in 1823 Thomas H. Benton, Martin Van Buren, and 
Robert Y. Hayne were there. In 1827 Daniel Webster 
entered; in 1831 Henry Clay returned ; and they were 
joined in 1832 by Calhoun. The pre-eminence of the 
Senate was settled. 

As I have said, everybody took an interest in public 
affairs; but as the "era of good feeling" began there 
were no radical differences of opinion on political sub- 
jects and no issues before the people which they re- 
garded as involving vital principles. As a conse- 
quence, politics descended to a lower level than it 
had occupied before. The heroic age had passed, 
and we were entering upon the day of small things. 
We were about to illustrate the truth that when a 
country is happy its history is dull. The large 
things had been disposed of, and, issues failing, 
the interest now centered in the officers. The chron- 

17 257 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

icier of the time must concern himself with a 
"dull, dismal labyrinth" of politicians' activities, 
which they covered over with a cloak of cant, 
but which had as their only object the gaining of 
offices. 



XXVI 

THE PRESIDENT 

IN the early days of the operation of the govern- 
ment of the United States there was a latent fear 
that the President would sooner or later develop into 
a king. He had so many functions such as the old 
king had exercised; he had so much authority over 
others; his general primacy was so well defined that 
it required Httle imagination to picture him using 
his power so as to extend it and continue it. Con- 
fidence that the office was a safe one and would not 
absorb the other functions of the government came 
as a consequence of the unselfish patriotism of the 
incumbents. In fact, the Constitution left some 
important features of the new government almost 
at the mercy of the individuals who should first be 
intrusted with the responsibility of putting them in 
operation. An ambitious man feeing President might 
have continued in ofiice for more than two terms; 
there was nothing in the law to prevent his re-election 
as long as he lived ; he was commander-in-chief of the 
army and the navy; it might have required a revolu- 
tion to dislodge him. But the first President com- 
manded universal confidence. It was known that he 
preferred farming to governing and that he would 
go back to his crops as soon as he could. The power 

259 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

of the Presidency actually diminished under John 
Adams. He left the ordinary duties of the ofEce to 
his subordinates. He was surrounded by faction, 
and the strength of the opposition party was growing 
steadily. Thomas Jefferson, who succeeded him, was 
the personification of opposition to large governmental 
powers. Unless he turned traitor to every political 
principle which he had ever uttered he could be de- 
pended upon not to stretch the functions of the 
Presidency. He used them actively and passed them 
on in good working order to his successor. Nothing 
had yet occurred to alarm the people. James Madi- 
son's record in public life was a guaranty that he 
would preserve the balance of power in the govern- 
ment. It was he who had proposed in the convention 
which framed the Constitution that there should be 
a President and had defined his duties. His ambi- 
tion was to see that the government, whose frame had 
come from his hands, should prove a success. So, by 
i8i5.there was a feeling of confidence in the institu- 
tion of the Presidency, for nothing had yet occurred 
to arouse apprehension that a President would try 
to deprive the people of their liberties. 

To everybody the President was the most impor- 
tant man in the country. There were a few ignorant 
people who could not have named the Secretary of 
State; there were many more who could not have 
named the Chief Justice; but no one could have been 
found who did not know that the President was 
James Madison. Thus far the Presidents had been 
men of broad and accepted reputation, to whom the 
office had come as the climax of long public service. 

260 



THE PRESIDENT 

There had only been four of them; the repubhc was 
very young ; and the fourth was less familiarly known 
to the great body of the people than any of his pred- 
ecessors had been. Yet he had had a longer public 
career than any of them. 

In 1768, when he was seventeen years old, James 
Madison entered the sophomore class at Princeton 
College, and he and several of his classmates founded 
the American Whig Society for the purpose of debat- 
ing questions of government. In 1836, when he was 
eighty-five years old, he wrote his last message, 
"Advice to My Country," in which he admonished 
posterity to cherish and perpetuate the union of the 
states. During the whole of this long period, for 
sixty-eight years, he was continuously concerned with 
problems affecting the government of America. He 
began his public service in 1774, and terminated it 
when he left the Presidency in 181 7. During a period 
of forty-three years he had been almost continuously 
in public office. There was no man in the United 
States to whom the title of statesman could so ap- 
propriately be applied. 

Some of the description of a great statesman which 
Buckle gives in his analysis of the talents of Btuke 
applies to Madison. He employed his learning with 
sobriety, and his political principles were practical. 
Although his mind was stored with ample material 
for generalization, as a legislator he did not generalize. 
He regarded statesmanship as an empirical science. 
He was well aware that in political practice the states- 
man must deal with himian nature, himian weaknesses, 
and human passions, and that his function is to direct 

261 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

or follow, not to force, public inclination. He was 
fully alive to the distinction between the broad gen- 
eralizations of philosophy and the principles of poli- 
tics. He never doubted for a moment that the peo- 
ple were his masters. So much of Buckle's picture of 
the statesman's mind he realized; but not all of 
Burke's political code, as Buckle expounds it, fitted 
him. He would have agreed that political principles 
were but the product of human reason; but he would 
have denied that it was a statesman's duty "to shape 
his own conduct, not according to his own principles, 
but according to the wishes of the people for whom 
he legislates and whom he is bound to obey." He 
would have insisted that a statesman should shape 
his conduct according to his principles and leave the 
people to remove him from his office if his conduct 
ran counter to their wishes. He would have insisted 
upon the validity of general principles in politics, and 
he would have denied that it was not an object of 
government to preserve particular institutions, if those 
institutions were, in his view, essential to the preserva- 
tion of principles. In fact, no American statesman 
would have proclaimed that he must obey the public 
demand, even if it required from him action which 
he believed to be wrong in principle. The public 
itself would have withdrawn its confidence from an 
agent who obeyed it and at the same time declared 
that he believed the action it required of him was 
wrong. It would have regarded his course as im- 
moral. It required that its agent should have a con- 
science, or, at any rate, should make it believe that 
he had. It recognized no distinction between polit- 

262 



THE PRESIDENT 

ical morality and private morality. What was wrong 
in private life was wrong in public life. The political 
principles of Madison were the political principles of 
those whom he represented. If he and they had not 
so believed they would have parted company. 

The President was a man of versatile scholarship 
and interests. He knew French and Italian; he had 
studied Hebrew; he kept up his knowledge of the 
classical languages. He had a taste for art, as his 
house at Montpelier demonstrated. It was designed 
for him by Thornton, and is a model of good taste in 
architecture. The interior was decorated with many 
works of art, some of which were of real excellence — 
Cardelli's busts of Jefferson and Adams, for example, 
and the marble medalUon of himself by Ceracchi. 
The grounds about the house were laid out artistical- 
ly, and repay the study of the landscape-gardener at 
the present day. He delighted in the beauties of 
nature, with which he had been surrounded from in- 
fancy. He was a scientific farmer and wrote learned 
addresses on agriculture. He was learned in theology, 
having at one time studied with the thought of be- 
coming a clergyman, and had read the French and 
English philosophers and skeptics. He was a natural- 
ist, read Buffon, and added to Buffon's information. 
He knew something of ethnology, especially with ref- 
erence to the origin of the Indians. He studied law; 
but this science, political economy, and social science 
all belonged to his erudition in political science, in 
which it is not an exaggeration to say that he had 
exhausted the record of human experience and rea- 
soning. 

263 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Happily for his usefulness, Madison understood the 
people of Virginia thoroughly, and was in complete 
sympathy with them, so he had a constituency upon 
which he could rely. He was always a little in ad- 
vance of them, and on occasion skilfully led them 
forward. He did so when, using an agent to act for 
him, he obtained from the legislature the invitation 
to the states for a general convention to consider 
interstate trade regulations, when the legislature was 
jealous of increasing federal power. From this in- 
vitation came the Annapolis convention, from which 
came the Philadelphia convention which framed the 
Constitution. 

Madison was accused of violating his convictions 
when he broke with Alexander Hamilton and joined 
Jefferson's party when the opposing parties formed, 
but there was no reason why he should not have been 
convinced that Hamilton's system of government was 
dangerous and unwise. All Virginia and most of 
America were so convinced. But if he believed that 
the charges made against Hamilton, in the effort to 
break his power, were true, his brains were working 
with unaccustomed feebleness. When men engage in 
political warfare they commonly lose their heads and 
something of their morals and deal foul blows as well 
as fair — 

In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong 

'Midst a contentious world, striving where none are strong. 

This period of political warfare was the weak point 
in Madison's career. The utmost that can be said 
(and it is not much) is that he was not as vindictive 

264 



THE PRESIDENT 

nor as vituperative as most of his contemporaries 
were. 

To the generation of statesmen who were rising in 
1815 Madison was already one of the figures in the 
pantheon. The chief of these new statesmen was 
Henry Clay. In his early life he had followed Madi- 
son, and he enjoyed the friendship and confidence of 
the President. In 1829, when Clay was at the height 
of his popularity, in the course of a private conversa- 
tion he gave it as his opinion that Madison was our 
greatest statesman and the first of American political 
writers. This opinion of his writings had reference 
to his numbers of The Federalist, his pamphlets, 
speeches, articles, and state papers. The most nota- 
ble of his writings, the journal of the debates in the 
convention which framed the Constitution and the 
explanatory introduction, had not yet appeared. 

I am not prepared to say that Clay's opinion was 
too strong. The writings of Madison cover a great 
range of subjects, which they treat with philosophic 
wisdom. At the present day there is hardly a de- 
cision of the Supreme Court dealing with constitu- 
tional construction which does not quote them as 
authority. They contain a wealth of authentic nar- 
rative history besides, and judicious discussions of 
those problems of government which are perennial. 

The Constitution of the United States was the 
crowning work of the revolutionary period of our 
history. It preserved for posterity the liberty which 
the Revolution won. Madison was the chief agent 
in calling together the convention which framed it. 
He drew up the plan of government upon which the 

265 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

convention based its work. He was confessedly the 
leading member of the convention. He was the chief 
agent in accomplishing the ratification of the Con- 
stitution. He was the leader of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, and consequently of Congress, when it 
adopted the measures which put the Constitution in 
operation. In constructive statesmanship no other 
American had a record the equal of his. 

His course while he was President did not add to 
his reputation. For the first time he was in an office 
where success required large administrative talents, 
and he had never had administrative experience. 
He found himself at the head of a nation in arms, and 
here his deficiencies were conspicuous. He hated war. 
All his life he had been searching for governmental 
policies which would render war unnecessary. With- 
out enthusiasm for fighting he could not inspire the 
nation with enthusiasm for the war. He watched the 
law and kept his own powers within cramped bounds. 
What the occasion demanded was a lusty warrior 
who would take all needed authority and settle the 
question of legality afterward. The war having ter- 
minated, the government had suffered no harm — 
there was that much to be said in favor of Madison's 
caution. 

The position which he occupied with the people 
was peculiar. They held him in respect, but he was 
hardly more than a name to them. He was the friend 
and coadjutor of Jefferson, and would carry on Jef- 
ferson's system of government. He had been a mem- 
ber of the Continental Congress, and was the father 
of the Constitution. They felt grateful to him and 

266 



THE PRESIDENT 

had confidence in him, and that was all. How cotild 
it be otherwise with a man who was only five feet six 
and a quarter inches tall, with a small, wizened body 
and a weak voice? 

His countenance was solemn and not handsome. 
So far as the public knew him he was always an old, 
sad-eyed man. There was never any of the dash and 
fire of youth in him. He made no open-air speeches, 
except among his immediate constituency in Vir- 
ginia. He never courted public attention. All of his 
published speeches and state papers were able com- 
positions, solid, closely reasoned, profound, and state- 
ly, but with no illumination from catching phrases, 
no inspiring appeals, nothing to warm the public heart. 

He had his enemies, but he himself hated no one, 
and those who disliked him were not many nor were 
they bitter. At one time they said he was in secret 
league with Napoleon, but they could hardly have 
believed so nonsensical a charge.' They said he sold 
himself to the Clay Republicans, exchanging his war 
message to Congress for a renomination for the Presi- 
dency, and this shocking accusation many people be- 
lieved and some historians have repeated. It was 
never proved, and recently discovered documents 
have disproved it. His character was assailed less 
than that of any of his contemporaries of similar 
public experience, and was, in fact, unassailable. 
The dislike for him entertained by those who had 
suffered from the commercial restrictions of his and 
Jefferson's administration was mitigated after the 
peace, when most of them became prosperous again, 
and he went into retirement pursued by no anathemas. 

267 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

It was his misfortune to be made fun of. Washing- 
ton Irving, going to Washington in search of an office 
in 1809, wrote in a familiar letter: 

Mrs. Madison is a fine, portly, buxom dame, who had a smile 
and a pleasant word for everybody. Her sisters, Mrs. Cutts and 
Mrs. Washington, are like two merry wives of Windsor, but as to 
Jemmy Madison — ah! poor Jemmy! he is but a withered little 
apple-John. 

When war was declared Richard Rush, then the 
Comptroller of the Treasury, wrote to his father that 
the President had visited the War and Navy Depart- 
ments, "stimulating everything in a manner worthy 
of a little commander-in-chief, with his little round 
hat and huge cockade." It is a pity for his fame that 
he should have been obliged to be "a little commander- 
in-chief." 

After the capture of Washington some verses were 
pubHshed in New York in the style of John Gilpin, 
entitled "The Bladensburg Races." The President 
is made to say to his wife: 

Quoth Madison unto his spouse, 
"Though frighted we have been 

These two last tedious weeks, yet we 
No enemy have seen." 

To which, after another verse, his wife replies: 

"To-morrow," then quoth she, "We'll fly 

As fast as we can pour 
Northward, unto Montgomery, 

All in our coach and four. 

"My sister Cutts, and Cutts, and I, 

And Cutts's children three. 
Will fill the coach; so you must ride 

On horseback after we — " 
268 




MRS. JAMES MADISON 
From an original painting by Gilbert Stuart 




JAMES MADISON 



THE PRESIDENT 

This last verse was an allusion to Mrs. Madison's 
sister and family, who frequented the White House 
during the Madison administration. 

The flight progresses from Bladensburg 

Then might all people well discern 

The gallant little man, 
His sword did thump behind his back, 

So merrily he ran. 

In private life, especially in Washington, Madison 
played rather a secondary part. Strangers who went 
to the receptions at the White House gave long de- 
scriptions of Mrs. Madison, and had only a perfunc- 
tory sentence about the President. He was a very 
modest man and did not shine in a large assemblage. 
He liked to see his wife the center of the circle, and 
was content himself to stand quietly on the edge. 
He never talked for show. Serious visitors who sought 
for information on political history found him an 
inexhaustible mine of information, frank, communi- 
cative, and amiable; but casual visitors who hoped 
to hear only words of wisdom from him, and to carry 
away with them some remarks which fitted his char- 
acter as the father of the Constitution, were apt to 
be disappointed. In fact, they might dine at his 
table and hear nothing but banter from him during 
the whole dinner. After dinner, if the men who sat 
around the table drinking their wine were his friends, 
the ladies from the adjoining room might hear loud 
roars of laughter from the President's guests, who were 
enjoying the President's broad and irresistible jokes. 
The sorrowful hazel eyes were often lightened by a 

269 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

mischievous twinkle, and the solemn mouth covered 
remarkably good teeth, which made the whole coun- 
tenance look gay when he smiled. 

To what extent was the President typical of his 
time? He belonged to the days which were passing 
and not to those which were coming. When he 
left the Presidency he retired definitely from pub- 
lic life, as his predecessors in that office had done, 
and the partisan personal bickering which soon be- 
came the most conspicuous feature of politics did not 
interest him. When the Missouri bill came up, and 
ten years later the nullification movement, he raised 
his voice and spoke his views; but in spite of every 
effort no one could get from him an opinion on the 
merits of the various politicians who were seeking 
public favor. His mind was occupied with the past, 
with the events of the Revolution, but particularly 
with the making of the Constitution, its meaning and 
the intention of its makers, and on these points his 
pronouncements were accepted as oracular. 

But, as I pointed out in a previous chapter, his 
administration, as it progressed, set steadily away 
from the old order, and before it closed became fairly 
representative of the new. When it closed William 
H. Crawford was the Secretary of the Treasury; the 
position of Secretary of War was vacant for the time, 
Crawford having been transferred from that office. 
The Attorney- General was Richard Rush, and the 
Secretary of the Navy was Benjamin W. Crownin- 
shield. Crowninshield represented the new repub- 
licanism of New England and the departure of that 
section from the Tory federalism which had hitherto 

270 



THE PRESIDENT 

dominated it. Rush was a Pennsylvania Republi- 
can, a member of an old and influential family in 
Philadelphia, where old families still had influence. 

The genius of the new order in politics was the 
Secretary of the Treasury. William H. Crawford 
was educated for the law, but became a member of 
the legislature of Georgia when he was twenty-one 
years of age. He came to the Senate and served for 
a time as president pro tempore. Madison sent him 
as Minister to France in 1813, and he entered the 
Cabinet in 18 15, first as Secretary of War, from which 
office he went to the Treasury Department in 1816. 
He served till John Quincy Adams became President 
in 1825, He was a candidate for the Presidency in 
1824, and came near being elected by the House of 
Representatives. He was a man of some parts as a 
lawyer, and closed his long career as a federal judge. 
He was a large man of bluff, democratic personality. 
He had a large circle of personal friends who were 
really devoted to him and thought him a great man. 
As Secretary of the Treasury he had many subordi- 
nates, and his activities among minor public officers 
extended beyond his department. In 1820 he suc- 
ceeded in having an act passed prescribing four years 
as the term of office of United States attorneys, col- 
lectors of customs, and a number of other minor 
officials. Thus, automatically and without the trouble 
of dismissal, a large number of offices were constantly 
falling vacant, there was a constant stream of appli- 
cants, there was incessant flow and life among the 
rank and file of politicians. He systematically em- 
ployed the officers of the Treasury Department and 

271 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

any other officers over whom he had influence as 
agents to further his poHtical fortunes. He was the 
first pubHc man to erect an effective political machine. 
He became a powerful factor in the politics of the 
country. He called himself a Jefifersonian Democrat, 
but he was not identified with any public measures 
involving broad principles. His management of the 
finances of the country was not notable. His main 
interest was in the manipulation of political groups 
with a view to securing the offices, and, having secured 
them, to so administer them as to retain them. Poli- 
tics was with him and his followers simply a contest 
for office. The forces behind men like Rush and 
Crowninshield were insignificant compared with the 
force behind Crawford. 



XXVII 

PATRIOTISM 

WHEN Benjamin Franklin was shown one of the 
medallions of the Society of the Cincinnati in 
1784, and was told that the design had been criticized 
because it more resembled a turkey than an eagle, he 
said he wished it had been a turkey, 

"For, in truth, the turkey is in comparison a much 
more respectable bird, and withal a true original native 
of America. Eagles have been found in all countries ; 
but the turkey is peculiar to ours. . . . He is, be- 
sides (though a little vain and silly, it is true, but 
none the worse emblem for that), a bird of courage, 
and would not hesitate to attack a grenadier of the 
British guards who should presume to invade his 
farm-yard with a red coat on." 

The patriarch had the same idea that possessed all 
his fellow-countrymen — everything must be our own, 
even to the symbols of heraldry. But he was a little 
unjust toward the eagle, for the Continental Congress, 
in adopting that bird as the central feature of the 
American arms, had required it to be "the American 
Eagle displayed proper," meaning the bald eagle, 
which is found only on this continent. 

The spirit of Americanism was manifested every- 
where. The President should not become a king, 

18 273 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

such as other countries had, but a chief executive 
with circumscribed powers, a chief such as no other 
country had. The government must be our own in 
all respect. Its various features might resemble the 
features of other governments, but they were not 
identical. The same spirit went into lesser things; 
nothing was acceptable unless it bore the American 
stamp. Dictionaries, the very language, novels, po- 
etry, plays, even art, education, prison discipline, 
medicine, the churches, must be American if they 
were to find favor and success on this continent. 
Happily, we were isolated and could develop unvexed 
by any rival civilization. The sea was our eastern 
boundary; on most of our north and all of our west 
was an uninhabited empire; and on the south were 
an inferior people who made no impression upon the 
people of the United States, except, by the contrast 
of their feebleness, to make their English-speaking 
neighbors more certain of their strength. There were 
no rivals near us and no foreigners within our borders. 
The immigrant came to stay. His dominating desire 
was to merge himself in American life. He obtained 
American citizenship as soon as the law allowed him 
to do so. He imbibed American institutions and for- 
got the institutions he had left behind him. He 
learned our language and often failed to teach his 
children his own mother's tongue. There was al- 
ways present a fear that the immigrant would inter- 
fere with the normal development of American life, 
but in reality he became more American than the 
natives themselves and embraced the American idea 
with a convert's zeal. 

274 



PATRIOTISM 

American nationality developed without the over- 
shadowing element of personal loyalty and devotion, 
which is one of the romantic features of the history of 
European states. The blending of affection and duty 
and the personification of patriotism have given 
much of the poetic coloring to the history of the 
countries from which Americans came, and that we 
have lived our national life without it is one of the 
reasons why people who read only for their pleasure 
think our history is dull. 

Far back in the history of the worid the patriotism 
was always personal, being, in fact, only an enlarge- 
ment of the devotion and subjection of the child to 
the parent. The head of the house, the patriarch, the 
leader of the tribe or clan, was the protecting father 
of his people. The kings were always kings over the 
people, and not over the land. The fact survives in 
the titles of some of the monarchs who now reign. 
The king of Belgium is King of the Belgians, of Den- 
mark is King of Denmark and the Wendes and the 
Goths, of Sweden is King of Sweden and of the Goths 
and the Vandals. In the course of time society ad- 
vanced from the nomadic and pastoral stage and be- 
came agricultural. It gained its sustenance by culti- 
vating the soil, and became fixed in its place of abode. 
From this condition a new idea of nationality arose — 
that it was appurtenant to the place of birth and resi- 
dence and was not derived from personal subjection 
and fealty alone. From the patriarchal state had arisen 
the doctrine of citizenship by descent, by kinship, by 
blood — the jus sanguinis of the Roman or civil law; 
from the agricultural state came the doctrine that 

275 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

citizenship was based upon the land — the jus soli of 
the English or common law. The newer doctrine did 
not supplant the sentiment of loyalty to a personal 
sovereign; but it introduced a new element into it. 
When nationality became territorial and not wholly 
personal the country took over the loyalty and de- 
votion which before had been monopolized by the pa- 
triarch or monarch. Then the man personified the 
land where he dwelt and whence he derived his sus- 
tenance. It became the fatherland, and he expressed 
his devotion to it by giving it the feminine pronoun 
she or her when he spoke of it, as he did when he 
spoke of his mother or his wife. Centuries after the 
reason for it had departed the old feeling of personal 
loyalty Hngered, held in men's minds by the survival 
of an organization of society which had been based 
upon it. It lingers yet, a survival of medieval times 
without logical excuse in the modern state. 

When America was settled the earliest pioneers 
came with the sentiment of personal loyalty still in 
their minds, but here it had nothing to feed upon. 
There were no visible requirements by the monarch 
of his subjects, no constant personal duties for them 
to perform. He was thousands of miles away. There 
was no royal court, no royal family, no royal army; 
there were no castles, no pageants; there was noth- 
ing to remind the people of the splendor or power of 
their king. A sentiment cannot live indefinitely upon 
nothing but recollection. The king was only a name 
in America, and the sense of personal loyalty to him 
steadily decreased. 

But the European brought with him also his feeling 

276 



PATRIOTISM 

of attachment to the soil, and that he transferred 
immediately to the new soil which nurtured him. 
Thus, while the memory of devotion to the old king 
grew weak, the attachment to the new country grew 
strong. Nevertheless, when the Revolution came there 
were many Americans with whom the sense of loyalty 
and duty was still so strong that they would not em- 
brace the patriot cause. For the most part, however, 
the loyaHsts were people who had recently come to 
America, or who had recently been back to England, 
or had relatives there, or were officers of the king, or 
were connected with the official class. The great 
body of the people threw off their personal allegiance 
without a pang of regret. The crown had long since 
ceased to occupy a place in their hearts. 

The attachment to the soil was necessarily an at- 
tachment to that part of it which the American knew, 
and that was his state rather than the continent. 
I have shown before that the American of 1815 did 
not travel; that, in fact, he could not; that he did 
not write many letters, as it took so long to get an 
answer and the expense of carriage was considerable; 
that he married a girl of his vicinity because he knew 
none other; that his schooling, if he got any, he received 
in his neighborhood ; that he derived little information 
from the newspapers; in short, that his interests and 
affections were circumscribed by a very small area. 
Before 1789 the government did nothing to enlarge 
his sphere. The Revolution had enlarged it, and for 
eight years he had seen the glimpse of a broad con- 
tinental nationality, but he lost sight of it afterward. 
A union loosely linked together by a government 

277 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

which existed only by sufferance and had no authority 
or power of its own; a government over which no 
person presided as chief, which was managed by 
agents who had no power to act without orders, in 
some sort a flimsy nation composed of thirteen in- 
dependent parts any one of which could destroy it 
at any time by affirmative action or even by no action 
at all; a government so constituted that it could not 
have any recognized leaders — such a government was 
more calculated to stifle continental patriotism than 
to arouse it. When all aspiration for a continental 
patriotism seemed about to die, by a feat of states- 
manship it was given a reviving stimulant by the 
new government. This new government operated 
directly upon the individual and caused him to feel 
his duty to it; and after a time it awakened his 
loyalty, too. It had a visible chief to preside over 
it, and national leaders to direct it and stimulate 
interest in it. There was the personal element, the 
absence of which had been one of the weaknesses of 
the old government. Soon patriotism meant devotion 
to the United States as well as to one state. By the 
time of the close of the War of 1812 patriotism was 
generally understood as being continental as well as 
sectional. As time went on inventions and discover- 
ies made travel easy and quick, and the communica- 
tion of intelligence became almost instantaneous, the 
sections of the country were brought close together, 
and the continental patriotism increased with great 
rapidity. After the artificial barrier of slavery which 
stood in its way had been removed it became a fact 
of universal acceptance. The people liked to believe 

278 



PATRIOTISM 

that this condition was fostered by the national gov- 
ernment, and soon after 1815 those who wished to 
please them, and who truly represented them, fell 
into the way of putting the adjective "glorious" in 
front of the word "Constitution" whenever they spoke 
of it. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The chief manuscript sources of this book are: 

The Madison, Jefiferson, Andrew Jackson, Thornton, 
Dolly Madison, Margaret Bayard Smith papers; the House 
of Representatives collection; the Benjamin Rush lectures; 
note-books of Dr. Edmund Physick; autograph letters of 
physicians (Toner collection); Shaker papers; billing-heads 
of stage lines — ^all in the Library of Congress. Mr. O. G. 
Sonneck's work on Early Opera in America, now in press, 
which he was good enough to allow me to see. 

The newspapers are: 

New Haven Connecticut Journal, Richmond Semi-Weekly 
Enquirer, Washington Daily National Intelligencer, New 
York Evening Post, Boston Gazette, Charleston Courier, New 
York Spectator, Paulson's American Advertiser, Philadelphia 
Mercantile Advertiser, Norfolk Herald, Niles Weekly Register 
— all for 1815 or approximate dates. 

The other periodicals are: 

Boston Weekly Magazine, 18 16; Evening Fireside, Phila- 
delphia, 1806; Columbian Telescope, Alexandria, 1819; A^or- 
f oik Repository, 1807; The Hive, Washington, 181 1; North 
American Review, 181 5; Literary Magazine, Philadelphia, 
1807; Monthly Anthology, Boston, 181 1; The Polyanthos, 
Philadelphia, 18 14; Academic Recreations, New York, 181 5; 
The American Review, Philadelphia, 181 2; The Eye, Phila- 
delphia, 1808; Journal of the Times, Baltimore, 1818; The 
Portfolio, Philadelphia, 181 5; Boston Weekly Messenger, 
1815; Athe7ieum, Boston, 1817; Analectic Magazine, Phila- 
delphia., 181 5; American Baptist Magazine, Boston, 181 7; 

280 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The Churchman's Magazine, Elizabeth-Town, N. J., 1814; 
The Christian's Magazine, New York, 181 1; Quarterly 
Theological Magazine, Burlington, N. J., 1813; The Pano- 
plist, Boston, 1815; The Guardian, New Haven, 1819; 
The Latter Day Luminary, Philadelphia, 181 8; The Adviser, 
or Vermont Evangelical Magazine, Middlebury, 181 5; 
The Methodist Magazine, New York, 181 1; The Christian 
Disciple, Boston, 181 5; The Almoner, Lexington, Ky., 
1814; The Christian Spectator, New Haven, 1819; The 
Alleghany Magazine, Meadville, Pa., 1816; The Christian 
Journal, New York, 181 7 ; The Christian Herald, New York, 
18 16; The General Repository, Cambridge, Mass., 18 13. 

Of general works: 

Autobiography of N. T. Hubbard, New York, 1875; The 
Description of the City of New York, by James Hardie, New 
York, 1827; Blunt' s Stranger's Guide to the City of New 
York, by E. M. Blunt, New York, 181 7; Reminiscences of 
an Old New Yorker, by William Alexander Duer, New York, 
1867; Reminiscences of an Octogenarian, by Charles H. 
Haswell, New York, 1896; History of the City of New York, 
by Martha J. Lamb, New York, 1877; New York, by 
Theodore Roosevelt, New York, 1891; Memorial History 
of the City of New York, edited by James Grant Wilson, 
New York, 1892; Philadelphia, A History of the City and 
Its People, by Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, Philadelphia, 191 2; 
A Topographical and Historical Description of Boston, by 
Charles Shaw, Boston, 181 7; Boston, by Henry Cabot 
Lodge, New York, 1891; Journal of William Maclay, 
edited by Edgar S. Maclay, New York, 1890; Disunion 
Sentiment in Congress in 1794, edited by Gaillard Hunt, 
Washington, 1905; The Life of John C. Calhoun, by Gail- 
lard Hunt, Philadelphia, 1907; The Bladensburg Races (no 
place or date, but really New York, 181 5); A Statistical 
View of the Commerce of the United States, by Timothy Pit- 
kin, Hartford, 18 16; Treaties and Conventions of the United 
States, Washington, 1873; Charters and Constitutions of the 
United States, Washington, 1878; The U. S. Statutes at 
Large; The Laws of the States (the Cession Laws ; not the 

281 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

general compiled statutes, which cannot be depended upon 
for historical purposes) ; The Histories of the Religious De- 
nominations in the American Church History Series, New 
York; Complete Works on Criminal Jurisprudence, by Ed- 
ward Livingston, New York, 1873. 

For general descriptions: 

An Historical View of the United States, by E. Mackenzie, 
New Castle upon Tyne, 1819; Apergii des Etats-Unis, by 
Louis A. Felix, Baron de Beaujour, Paris, 1814; Travels in 
America, by Thomas Ashe, Newburyport, 1808; A Sum- 
mary View of America, by Isaac Candler, London, 1824; 
A Tour in America,hy Richard Parkinson, London, 1805; 
A Short System of the Geography of Uie World, by Nathaniel 
Dwight, Hartford, 1795; Universal Geography, by Mr. 
Malte-Brun, Philadelphia, 1827; An American Universal 
Geography, by Jedidiah Morse, Charlestown, 18 19; A New 
System of Modern Geography, by Sidney E. Morse, Boston, 
1822 ; The World As It Is, by Samuel Perkins, New Haven, 
1837; Elements of Geography, by Benjamin Workman, 
Philadelphia, 1816. 

For the Madisons, the White House, and the City of 
Washington : 

The Court Circles of the Republic, by Mrs. E. F. Ellet, 
Hartford, 1869; TJie First Forty Years of Washington So- 
ciety, by Margaret Bayard Smith, Gaillard Hunt, editor. 
New York, 1906; The Life of James Madison, by Gaillard 
Hunt, New York, 1902; Dolly Madison, by Maud Wilder 
Goodwin, New York, 1896; Memoirs and Letters of Dolly 
Madison, edited by her grandniece, Boston and New York, 
1911. 

Concerning women: 

Letters on Female Character, by Mrs. Virginia Gary, 
Hartford, 1831 ; The Discussion, or the Character, Education, 
&c., of Women, Boston, 1837; The Ladys Pocket Library, 
Philadelphia, 1792; The Female Friend, or the Duties of 

Christian Virgins, by F L , Baltimore, 1809; 

Familiar Letters to Females, by a Lady, Boston, 1834; Vin- 
dication of the Rights of Wmnen, by Mary Wollstonecraft, 

282 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Philadelphia, 1794; Nuptial Dialogues and Debates, by 
Edward Ward, Philadelphia, 181 1; Sketches of the Fair 
Sex, by a Friend of the Sex, Gettysburg, 181 2; Epistles on 
Women, by Lucy Aiken, Boston, 1810; Women in All Ages 
and Nations, by Thomas L. Nichols, New York, 1854; The 
American Lady, Philadelphia, 1836; The Excellency of the 
Female Character Vindicated, by T. Branagan, Harrisburg, 
1828; Letters to a Young Lady in which the Duties, &c., of 
Women are Considered, by Mrs. Jane West, New York, 
1806; The Young Woman's Guide to Excellence, by William 
A. Alcott, Boston, 1840; A Daughter's Own Book, or Prac- 
tical Hints from a Father to His Daughter, Philadelphia, 1836 ; 
The Young Lady's Friend, by a Lady, Boston, 1836; A Prac- 
tical Directory for Young Christian Females, by Harvey 
Newcomb, Boston, 1833; Parental Legacies, Consisting of 
Advice from a Lady of Quality to Her Children, Boston, 1804; 
A Mirror for the Female Sex, by Mrs. Pilkington, Hartford, 
1799. 

On dress: 

Costumes of Colonial Times, by Alice Morse Earle, New 
York, 1894; Two Centuries of Costume in America, by 
Alice Morse Earle, New York, 1903; Modes and Manners 
of the Nineteenth Century, by Max von Bohn, New York, 
1909; Costume of British Ladies from the Time of William I. 
to the Reign of Queen Victoria, London, 1840; and the 
contemporaneous fashion-plates and illustrations in books. 

On the laboring- men: 

The Labor Problem, by William E. Bams, New York, 
1886; The Labor Movement in America, by Richard T. Ely, 
New York, 1890; The Labor Movement, by George Edwin 
McNeill, New York, 1887. 

On the theater and music: 

History of the American Theatre, by William Dunlap, 
New York, 1832; Early Concert Life in America, by O. G. 
Sonneck, Leipzig, 1907; The Star-spangled Banner, America, 
Yankee Doodle, Hail Columbia, by O. G. Sonneck, Washing- 
ton, 1909 (the chapter on The Star-spangled Banner issued 
separately in a much revised and enlarged version in 1914) ; 

283 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Plays and Players, by Laurence Hutton, New York, 1S75; 
The Democratic Songster, Baltimore, 1794. 

On literature : 

Salamagundi, or the Whim-whatns and Opinions oj 
Launcelot Langstaff, New York, 1807; Precaution (James 
Fenimore Cooper), New York, 1820; Old-time Schools and 
School-books, by Clifton Johnson, New York, 1904; James 
Fenimore Cooper, by Thomas R. Lounsbury, Boston, 1883; 
Washington Irving, by Charles Dudley Warner, Boston, 
1882; Modern Chivalry, by Hugh Henry Brackenridge, 
Richmond, 181 5; Contributions to American Educational 
History, Vol. I (Herbert B. Adams), Washington, 1889; 
by Noah Webster: American Selections of Lessons in 
Reading and Speaking,'Ph.i\3.dQ[phisi, i787,Iand later editions; 
The American Spelling-book, Containing an Easy Standard of 
Pronunciation, 1790 and other editions; A Collection oj 
Papers on Political, Literary, and Moral Subjects, New York, 
1843; -^^^ American Dictionary of the English Language, 
1 84 1 and other editions; Dissertations on the English Lan- 
guage, lySg; The Elementary Primer, i8t,i; A Grammatical 
Institute of the English Language, Hartford, 1784; The 
Columbiad, by Joel Barlow, London, 1809; An Elegy on 
Titus Hosmer, by Joel Barlow, Hartford (no date); Noah 
Webster, by Emily Ellsworth Fowler Ford and Emily Ells- 
worth Ford Skeil, New York, 1912 (privately printed); 
Four Southern Magazines, by Edward Reinhold Ropes, 
Richmond, 1902; The Southern Literary Messenger, by 
Benjamin Blake Minor, Washington, 1905. 

On food and cookery: 

Miss Beecher's Domestic Receipt Book, New York, 1846; 
The Frugal Housewife, or Complete Woman Cook, by Susan- 
nah Carter, New York, 1803; The Art of Cookery made 
Plain and Easy, by Mrs. Glasse, Alexandria, 1805; The 
Art of Invigorating and Prolonging Life, by the author of 
the Cook's Oracle, Philadelphia, 1823; Apician Morsels, 
by Dick Humbugius Secundus, New York, 1829; The 
Young Housekeeper, or Thoughts on Food and Cookery, by 
William A. Alcott, Boston, 1838; Old Cookery Books and 

284 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Ancient Cuisine, by W. Carew-Hazlitt, New York, 1886; 
The Housekeeper's Book, by a Lady, Philadelphia,' 1837; 
Physiologie du Gout, by Brillat-Savarin, Paris; A History 
of the Oyster, by T. C. Eyton, London, 1858; Investigations 
on the Nutrition of Man in the United States, by C. F. 
Langworthy and R. D. Milner, Washington, 1904; The 
House Servant's Directory, by Robert Roberts, Boston, 1828; 
The Cook's Own Book, by a Boston Housekeeper, Boston, 
1837; A New System of Domestic Cookery, by a Lady, New- 
York, 1817; The Kentucky Housewife, by Mrs. Lattice 
Bryan, Cincinnati, 1841; The Experienced American 
Housekeeper, Hartford, 1833 ; -^ Short Treatise on the Habits 
and Character of the Oyster, by John Gardener, Opener 
General at Le Count's United States Refectory, corner 
Fifth and Chestnut Streets, Philadelphia, 1837; The In- 
fluence of Atmosphere on Human Health, by Robley Dun- 
ghson, M.D., Philadelphia, 1835; "Ancient American 
Bread," article by Henry Chapman Mercer, 1894 (reprint); 
The Food of Certain American Indians, by Lucien Carr, 
Worcester, 1895 (American Antiquarian Society's Pro- 
ceedings) ; The New Mirror for Travellers, by an Amateur 
(James Kirke Paulding), New York, 1828. 

On communities: 

Plan for a Free Community upon the Coast of Africa, 
London, 1789; History of American Socialisms, by John 
Himiphrey Noyes, Philadelphia, 1870; American Com- 
munities, by William Alfred Hinds, Oneida, 1878; Second 
Edition, Chicago, 1908; History of the Zoar Society, by 
E. O. Randall, Columbus, 1900; The Harmony Society, 
by John Archibald Bole, Ph.D., Philadelphia, 1904; The 
Communistic Societies of the United States, by Charles 
Nordhoff, New York, 1875; History of the Great Ameri- 
can Fortunes, by Gustavus Myers, Vol. I, Chicago, 19 10; 
Industrial History of the United States, by Katharine Aman, 
Ph.D., New York, 19 10; The Economic History of the 
United States, by Ernest Ludlow Bogart, Ph.D., New York, 
1912; Commercial Directory, Philadelphia, 1823; Robert 
Owen, by Frank Podmore, London, 1906; An Essay on 

285 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

Commonwealths, New York, 1822 (containing the constitu- 
tion of the New York Society for Promoting Communities). 

On sport, crimes, and vices: 

The South Carolina Jockey Club, by John B. Irving, 
Charleston, 1857; Game Fowls, by J. W. Cooper, Media, 
Pa., 1859; The Game Fowl, Its Origin and History, by R. A. 
Mclntyre, 1906; History of the Temperance Reformation, by 
Lebbens Armstrong, New York, 1853; A Voice from the 
Washingtonian Home, by David Harrison, Jr., Boston, 
i860; History of the First Inebriate Asylum, by its Founder 
(J. Edward Turner), New York, 1888; Political Truth 
(Gaming Laws in Virginia), by Virginius, Richmond (no 
date); Memoirs of Robert Bailey, Richmond, 1822; The 
Trail of Blood, Record of Crime, New York, i860; United 
States Criminal History, by P. R. HambHn, Fayetteville, 
New York, 1836; Lives of the Felons, New York, 1846 ; Lynch 
Law, by James Elbert Cutler, New York, 1905; The Record 
of Crimes in the United States, Buffalo, 1833; Murder in 
All Ages, by Matthew Worth Pinkerton, Chicago, 1898; 
The Exposition, Remonstrance, and Protest of Don Vincente 
Pazos, Philadelphia, 18 18; Pirates' Own Book, Philadelphia, 
A 1 841; Narrative of a Voyage to the Spanish Main in the 
V Ship " Two Friends,'" London, 1819 ; The Sabbath in Puritan 
New England, by Alice Morse Earle, New York, 1891; 
Sunday Legislation, by Abram Herbert Lewis, New York, 
1902; Proceedings of the Middlesex Convention, Andover, 
i8i4' Sunday Laws, by George E. Harris, Rochester, 1892; 
American State Papers bearing on Sunday Legislation, 
William Addison Blakely, editor. New York and Washing- 
ton, 1890; The American Turf, New York, 1898. 

On charitable institutions, hospitals, asylums, poor- 
houses, prisons: 

Report of Secretary of State of New York, Returns of 
County Superintendents of the Poor, Albany, 1833; Report 
of Delegate from Benevolent Societies of Bostctn, Boston, 1834; 
Report of the Examination of Poor-houses, Jails, &c., in the 
State of New York, by Samuel Chipman, Albany, 1835; 
Statement of the Provision for the Poor, by Nessau W. 

286 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Senior, London, 1835; Remarks on Prisons and Prison 
Discipline, from the Christian Examiner, Boston, 1826; 
Directory of the Washington Benevolent Society, Boston, 1813 ; 
Charities in the District of Columbia (Part III, historical), 
Washington, 1898; History of Poor Relief Legislation in 
Pennsylvania, by William Clinton Heffner, Cleona, Pa., 
1913 ; Private Charitable Institutions of the City of New York, 
New York, 1904; Report of William Crawford on the Peni- 
tentiaries of the United States, 1834 (Parliamentary Report); 
Penal and Charitable Institutions of Pennsylvania, Harris- 
burg, 1897; Thoughts on Penitentiaries and Prison Discipline, 
by Mathew Carey, Philadelphia, 1831; The Philanthropist, 
by a Pennsylvanian, Philadelphia, 18 13; Report on the 
Penitentiary System in the United States, New York, 1822; 
Remarks on Prisons and Prison Discipline in the United 
States, by D. L. Dix, Philadelphia, 1845; Penal and Re- 
formatory Institutions (Russell Sage Foundation), Charles 
Richmond Henderson, editor. New York, 1910; Hospitals, 
Their History, Organization, and Construction, by W. Gill 
Wylie, New York, 1877; The Charities of New York, by 
Henry J. Cammann and Hugh N. Camp, New York, 1868; 
American Charities, by Amos G. Warner, New York, 1894 
and 1908 ; History of Philadelphia Almshouses and Hospitals, 
by Charles Lawrence, Philadelphia, 1905; Appeal to the 
Wealthy of the Land, by Mathew Carey, Philadelphia, 
1833; The Overseers of the Poor of the City of Boston to 
Their Constituents, Boston, 1822; An Account of Bellevue 
Hospital, Robert J. Carlisle, editor. New York, 1893; Ac- 
count of the Friends Asylum, Philadelphia, 18 14; Memorial 
Soliciting a State Hospital for the Insane, submitted to 
the legislature of Pennsylvania by Dorothea Lynde Dix, 
Philadelphia, 1845; History of the Pennsylvania Hospital, 
by Thomas G. Morton and Frank Woodbury, Philadel- 
phia, 1895. 

Miscellaneous: 

Bioren's Pennsylvania Pocket Remembrancer, Philadel- 
phia, 18 16; American Almanac, Germantown, 18 16; The 
Farmer's Almanac, Boston, 183 1 ; The New Haven Almanac, 

287 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 

New Haven, 1825; The Vermont Register and Almanac, 
Burlington, 18 18; Hagerstown Toimi and Country Almanac, 
Hagerstown, 1836; Sam Slick oj Slickville, by Thomas C. 
Haliburton, New York, 1878; Old Town Folks, by Mrs. 
Harriet Beecher Stowe, Boston, 1869; History oJ Yellow 
Fever, by George Augustin, New Orleans, 1909; Century oJ 
American Medicine, New York, 1876; A Treatise on Febrile 
Diseases, by A. P. Wilson, Philadelphia, 181 6; Introduc- 
tory Discourse, by David Hosack, New York, 1813; 
Lectures, by David Hosack, Philadelphia, 1838; Essays 
on Various Subjects of Medical Science, by David Hosack, 
New York, 1824; The American Rush- Light, by Peter 
Porcupine (William Cobbett), London, 1800; Old Family 
Letters Copied for Edward Biddle, Philadelphia, 1892. The 
following by Benjamin Rush: An Account oj the Causes 
oJ Longevity, Philadelphia, 1793; Essays, Philadelphia, 
1806; An Enquiry into the Effects of Ardent Spirits upon 
the Human Body and Mind, New York, 181 1; Medical 
Enquiries and Observations, Philadelphia, 1805; Observa- 
tions on the Origin of Malignant, Bilious or Yellow Fever 
in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, 1799. 



INDEX 



Actors and audiences, 88-89. 

Adams, John, surviving signer, 8; 
on titles, 58; candidate for 
presidency, 74; appoints day 
of fasting, 115; diminished the 
powe r of the presidency, 
260. 

Adams, Mrs. John, 60. 

Adultery, punishments for, 
84. 

Albany, travel to, 51. 

Alien and Sedition Laws, 252. 

Allen, Lieut. William H., U.S.N., 
161. 

AUston, Washington, portrait- 
painter, 85. 

Amelia Island, headquarters for 
slave-smugglers, 164. 

American Academy of Fine Arts, 
organized, 85. 

American Colonization Society, 
236-238. 

American Whig Society, 261. 

Analectic, The, 146. 

Annapolis, society in, 71. 

Anti-rent war, 231. 

Appleton, James, report on tem- 
perance to Maine legislature, 
174. 

Apprentice system, 100. 

Armstrong, John, Secretary of 
War, 9. 

Art in America, 85. 

Ashe, Thomas, writings on Ameri- 
ca, 28. 

Astor, John Jacob, 230. 

Augusta, mail route to, 52. 

Aury, Louis de, Governor of 
Texas, 163-164. 

19 



B 



Bache, Miss, granddaughter of 
Franklin, 89. 

Bailey, "Major" Robert, gam- 
bler, 182. 

Baker, Anthony St. John, i. 

Baltimore, population, 22; iron- 
works, 24; appearance of, 30; 
society in, 71; French opera 
in, 97; " Washingtonian move- 
ment" in, 174; yellow-fever 
epidemics, 208. 

Banking, 231. 

Baptists, disapproval of theater, 
86; popularity of, 121. 

Barbour, Senator James, 45. 

Barker, James N., playwright, 92. 

Barlow, Joel, of Connecticut, 114; 
author of "The Columbiad," 
142-143. 

Beaujour, Felix de, opinion of 
America, 30. 

Bell Tavern, Richmond, 52. 

Bellevue Hospital, New York, 197. 

Benton, Senator Thomas H., 257. 

Bigelow, Dr. Jacob, 205. 

Billings, William, composer, 96. 

Bingham, William, richest man in 
America, 230; enters Senate, 257. 

Bladensburg, defeat at, 4. 

Bladensburg Races, The, 268. 

Blasphemy, laws against, 1 86. 

Books in farm-houses, 104-105. 

Boston, population, 22; glass- 
works, 24; appearance of, 30; 
stage at, 51; society of, 69-70; 
theaters, 87, 90; music in, 96; 
benevolent associations, 196- 
197. 

Brashear, Dr. Walter, 213. 

89 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



Bridgetown, stage line at, 49. 
Bristed, John, author of "The 

Resources of the U. S.," 25. 
Brooklyn, ferry to, 50. 
Brown, Charles Brockden, first 

American novelist, 147. 
Brown University, founding of, 

128. 
Brunswick, steamboat line to, 51. 



Caldwell, James H., erected thea- 
ters, 87. 

Calhoun, John C, age, 10; on 
slavery, 39; a slaveholder, 43, 
45; candidate for presidency, 
74; in Senate, 257. 

Campbell, George W., Secretary 
of the Treasury, 9; a slave- 
holder, 43. 

Candler, Isaac, opinion of Ameri- 
ca, 29. 

Card-playing, 181-182, 

Carey, JAIathew, reformer, 191, 
194. 

Carr, Benjamin, musician, 97. 

Carrea da Serra, Ahh6, Portu- 
guese minister, 64. 

Carroll, Charles, of CarroUton, 
signer, 8; on titles, 58-59; in 
Senate, 256. 

Carroll, Henry, brought copy of 
Peace Treaty to Washington, 
1-4. 

Carroll, John, Bishop, 122, 146. 

Cartage, prices for, 99-100. 

Charity, 106. 

Charleston, population, 22; ap- 
pearance of, 30; characteristics 
of people, 36; society in, 71-72; 
St. Cecelia Society organized, 
96; Jews in, 123; Washington 
race-course near, 177-178; yel- 
low fever in, 208. 

Chase, Samuel, Federalist parti- 
san, 254. 

Chcves, Langdon, age, 10; a slave- 
holder, 43-45. 

Chickasaw Indians, 21. 

Chippewa Indians, 21. 

Choctaw Indians, 21. i 



Church, attendance obligatory, 

98. 
Cincinnati, Society of the, 273. 
Cities in America, population, 22. 
City Hall in New York, 69. 
City Hotel, Philadelphia, stage 

at, 50. 
Clay, Henry, Speaker of House, 
10; on slavery, 42-43; slave- 
holder, 45; in Senate, 257. 

Clinton, Governor George, 92; 
pardons Ann Lee, 240. 

Clothes, 61-63. 

Cobbet, William, "Peter Porcu- 
pine," 210. 

Cock-fighting, 180. 

Coles, Miss Sally, 7. 

Colleges, 55. 

Columbia, S. C, mail route to, 
52. 

Columbian Telescope and Literary 
Compiler, 144-145. 

Commerce, state of, 25-26. 

Concerts, 96. 

Congregational Church, 122-123. 

Connecticut, political tranquilhty 
in, 37; divorce in, 84; laws 
against theaters in, 87; state 
support for religion, 117; Shak- 
ers in, 239. 

Cooke, George Frederick, actor, 
89. 

Cookery, 215-222. 

Cooper, James Fenimore, novels 
of, 148. 

Cooper, Thomas Abthorpe, actor, 
89. 

Craik, Dr., Washington's physi- 
cian, 202. 

Crawford, William H., member of 
the Cabinet, 9; a slaveholder, 
43; candidate for presidency, 
74; Secretary of Treasury, 270- 
271. 

Creek Indians, 21. 

Crimes and punishments, 157- 
160. 

Crowninshield, Benjamin W., Sec- 
retary of the Navy, 9, 270. 

Cullen, Dr. William, 206. 

Currie, Dr. William, 210. 

Custus, Elizabeth Parke, 83, 



290 



INDEX 



D 

Dallas, Alexander H., Secretary 
of the Treasury, 9. 

Dallas, George M., U. S. Attorney 
at Philadelphia, 166. 

Darley, Mr. and Mrs., actors, 89. 

Dartmouth College founded, 128. 

Deaf and dumb, schools for, 199. 

Debts and debtors, 169-170. 

Declaration of Independence, 
signers of, 8. 

Delaware Indians, 21. 

Delaware, slaves in, 21, 39; di- 
vorce in, 83; religious freedom 
in, 118; legal punishments in, 
159; opposed Virginia and 
Kentucky Resolutions, 255. 

Detroit, surrender at, 4. 

Dickinson, Charles, 154. 

District of Columbia, 21. 

Divinity schools, 129-130. 

Divorce in U. S., 83. 

Doctors, 106; and medical treat- 
ment, 201-214. 

Dow, Neal, law of, 174. 

Dress, of women, 61 ; of men, 63. 

Drinking, 32, 104, 171-175, 225- 
227. 

Dueling, 154, 157. 

Dunlap, William, playwright, 92. 

Dutch in the U. S., 19-20, 32, 38. 

E 

Education, 124-138. 
Elizabethtown, stage to, 50. 
Ellery, William, signer, 8. 
Ellsworth, Oliver, Senator, 250- 

251, 256; Chief Justice, 254. 
Emerson, Rev. Joseph, girls' 

seminary of, 134. 
England, American interest in 

and sympathy with, 10-12. 
England, peace with United States, 

4-5- 
English in America, 32. 
Entertainments and sports on 

farms, 103-104. 
Episcopal Church lost state sup- 
port, 119; new energy of, 121- 

122, 



Episcopalians and the theater, 86. 

Eppes, Mrs., 60. 

Eustis, William, Secretary of War, 

9. 

Eye, The, published at Philadel- 
phia, 144. 

F 

Factories and mills, 98-99. 
Farm life, 103-104. 
Federal Street Theater, Boston, 87. 
Federalists, the, and Treaty of 

Ghent, 6. 
Female Friend, The, 175. 
Fitch, John, steamboat of, 56. 
Floridas, 16-17. 
Floyd, William, signer, 8. 
Food, 216-223. 
Foreign opinion of the United 

States, 27-33. 
France, American interest in, 

11-12. 
Franklin, Benjamin, urges higher 

education, 124; on the folly of 

drinking, 173; investigated Mes- 

mer, 214; on patriotism, 273. 
Franklin House, Washington, 52. 
French in the United States, 19- 

20. 
Fulton, Robert, steamboat of, 56. 



Gaillard, John, slaveholder, 43. 

Gallatin, Albert, Secretary of 
Treasury, 9. 

Gallaudet, Thomas H., 199. 

Galveston Island, 163-164. 

Gambling, 175-183. 

Gaston, William, of North Caro- 
lina, 45. 

Gehot, Joseph, musician, 97. 

GenSt, Citizen, 92. 

Georgetown College, opening of, 
128. 

Georgetown, Semmes Tavern at, 
52; society in, 65. 

Georgia, value of land in, 23; 
characteristics of people, 36; 
divorce in, 83; religious free- 
dom in, 118; Methodists in, 
121; criminal code of, 158. 



291 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



Germans in the United States, 19, 

38. 
Gerry, Elbridge, Vice-President, 

8. 
Ghent, Treaty of, news brought to 

America, 1-7. 
Gibbs, Charles, pirate, i6r. 
Gilman, Nicholas, member of 

Congress, 8. 
Girard, Stephen, wealth of, 230. 
Girls' schools, 133-134. 
Gould, Judge James, 131. 
Government, 248-258. 
Gram, Dr., 214. 

Graupner, Gottlieb, musician, 97. 
"Great Revival, The," 120. 
"Grecian Daughter, The," gala 

performance in New York, 

92-93- 

Greenwood, John, dentist, 212. 

Griswold, Roger, on Louisiana, 15. 

Grundy, FeUx, age, 10; slave- 
holder, 43, 45. 

Grymes, John R., United States 
Attorney at New Orleans, 162. 

H 

Hahnemanism, 214. 

Hallam, Mr. and Mrs., actors, 89. 

Hamilton, Alexander, 114; duel 

with Burr, 155; dines with 

Jeflferson, 224 ; Madison's break 

with, 264. 
Hammond, John H., Senator from 

South Carolina, 71. 
Harmony Society, 242-243. 
Harrison, Gen. William H., 226. 
Hartford, theater in, 87; school 

for deaf and dumb, 199. 
Hartford Convention, 253. 
Harvard, John, 127. 
Harvard College, 127, 129. 
Harwood, John E., actor, 89. 
Hayne, Robert J., Senator, 257. 
Henry, John, Senator, 257. 
Hewitt, James, conductor of New 

York orchestra, 89, 97. 
High schools, 133. 
Highwaymen, 166. 
Hodgkinson, Mr. and Mrs., actors, 

89. 



Holden, Oliver, composer, 96. 
Holman, Joseph George, actor, 

89. 
Hopkins, Samuel, of Rhode Island, 

234- 
Hopkinson, Francis, composer, 96. 
Hopkinson, Joseph, composer of 

"Hail Columbia," 94. 
Hosack, Dr. David, 203, 207, 213. 
Horse-boat, ferry, 50. 
Humor, early American, 107-1 13. 
Hyer, Jacob, prize-fighter, 181. 



Illinois, admission to Union, 17; 
population of, 21. 

Immigrants, loi. 

Indian, population, 21; music, 
95; religion, 123. 

Indian Queen Hotel in Washing- 
ton, 52. 

Indian Territory, 20. 

Indiana, admission to Union, 17; 
population, 21. 

Indiana, Shaker communities in, 
240. 

Ingalls, Dr. John, 213. 

Ingersoll, Jared, influence of, 9. 

Insane, treatment of, 198-199. 

Irish in the United States, 19-20, 
101-102. 

Irving, Washington, 145; reputa- 
tion of, 148 ; makes fun of Madi- 
son, 268. 

Irving, WiUiam, 145. 



Jackson, Andrew, 4; unknown to 
Europeans, 27; and Washington 
society, 67, 74; popular hero, 
124-125; duels of, 154-155; 
aided by the Lafittes, 163 ; fought 
Bank of the United States, 231; 
proclaims disunion treason, 252. 

Jay, John, advocates emancipa- 
tion of slaves, 234; confirma- 
tion opposed, 251. 

Jefferson, Thomas, signer, 8; in 
White House, 60; interest in 
education, 127; promotes vac- 



292 



INDEX 



cination, 208; gives dinner to 
Alexander Hamilton, 223; op- 
position to large governmental 
powers, 260; friend of Madi- 
son, 266. 

Jews, small number of, in United 
States, 123. 

Jones, William, Secretary of the 
Navy, 9. 

Joor, William, playwright, 92. 

Journal of the Times, The, pub- 
lished at Baltimore, 144. 

K 

Kentucky, admission to Union, 
17; population, 20; slaves, 21; 
characteristics of people, 38; 
divorce in, 83; religious free- 
dom in, 118; Methodists in, 
121; Shakers in, 239. 

Key, Francis Scott, composer of 
"Star-spangled Banner," 94. 

King, Rufus, Senator, 8-9, 250- 
251, 256. 

King's Chapel in Boston, 96. 

King's College (Columbia Uni- 
versity) founded, 128. 

Kissam, Dr. Richard S., 212. 



Labor, conditions of, 98-103. 

Lafitte, Jean, Pierre, and Do- 
minique, outlaws, 162. 

Land, value of, 23. 

Languages used, 20. 

Latrobe, Benjamin H., furnishes 
White House,'6o. 

Law, Andrew, composer, 96. 

Law -schools, 130-131. 

Law, Thomas, married Elizabeth 
Custis, 83. 

Lear, Tobias, 201. 

Lee, Ann, founder of Shakers, 239. 

Lee, Richard Henry, Senator, 256. 

Literary Magazine, The, 146. 

Literary taste, 146-147. 

Livingston, Edward, writer on 
prison reform, 191, 193; on 
poor relief, 195. 

Livingston, Elizabeth Stevens, 76. 



Livingston, Robert R., of Cler- 
mont, 76. 

Local jealousies and misunder- 
standings, 34. 

Louisiana, British evacuation of, 
3; objections to acquiring, 15; 
admission, 17, 252; French 
population of, 19-20, 36; di- 
vorce laws in, 83; religious free- 
dom in, 118; criminal code of, 

159, 193- 

Lowndes, Caleb, Quaker writer, 
191. 

Lowndes, William, 10; slave- 
holder, 43-45- 

Lowndes, Mrs., 45. 

M 

McDonough, Commodore, toast 
to, 225. 

McDowell, Dr. Ephraim, 204, 212. 

Macaulay on parties, 11. 

MacGregor, Gregor, freebooter, 
163-164. 

Mackenzie's opinions of Ameri- 
cans, 32. 

Maclay, William, on titles, 58. 

Macon, Nathaniel, of North Caro- 
lina, 45. 

Madison, James, receives treaty, 
3, 7; retirement from office, 9; 
slaveholder, 43; praised Por- 
tuguese minister, 64; inaugural 
suit of, 76; issues proclamation 
of thanks, 115; offers amend- 
ment to Virginia Bill of Rights, 
116; owned interest in a race- 
horse, 177; Washington's criti- 
cism of, 201; listened to pro- 
posal to dissolve the Union, 251 ; 
preserved balance of power, 260 ; 
long public service, 261-262; 
scholarship, 263; break with 
Hamilton, 264; Clay's opinion 
of, 265; hatred of war, 266; 
appearance of, 267; private life, 
269, 

Madison, Mrs. Dolly, receives 
news of peace, 7-8; head of 
society, 60; clothes described, 
61; exerted no political in- 



293 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



fluence, 75; organizes orphan 
asylum, 197; at Monticello, 
221; appearance of, 268-269. 

Madison Hotel in Philadelphia, 
68. 

Maine, admission to Union, 17; 
Shakers in, 239. 

Mansion House, Philadelphia, 50. 

Manufacturing, state of, 24. 

Marshall, Chief Justice, 45, 255- 
256. 

Maryland, population of, 20-21; 
characteristics of planters, 35; 
divorce in, 83; Declaration of 
Rights, 117; criminal code in, 

159- 

Mason, Armistead T., killed in 
duel, 154. 

Mason, George, on slavery, 39, 
42,44. 

Massachusetts, population, 20-21 ; 
abolished slavery, 39; theaters 
in, 87; wages in, 100; and re- 
ligious worship, 117; insane 
asylum, 199; Shakers in, 239; 
Federalists threaten disunion, 
252. 

Medical schools, 130, 211. 

Merry, Mrs., actress, 89. 

Methodist Church disapproval of 
theater, 86; affected by Revo- 
lution, 119; traveling preachers, 
121 ; abstinence crusade of, 174. 

Michigan, admission to Union, 
17; population, 21; Military 
academy at West Point, 131. 

Mississippi, admission to Union, 

17- 

Missouri, admission to Union, 17; 
popiilation, 21. 

Mobile, mail route to, 52. 

Mongaret's opinion of Ameri- 
cans, 31. 

Monroe, James, receives Treaty 
of Ghent, 3-4; Secretary of 
State, 10; slaveholder, 43, 45; 
influence of women in adminis- 
tration of, 74; in Senate, 256. 

Monthly Magazine, The, 146. 

Montule's opinion of Americans, 
32. 

More, Hannah, 78-79, 81. 



Morris, [Gouverneur, old age of, 

9- . 
Morris, Robert, in Senate, 256. 
Mott, Dr. Valentine, 213. 
Music, American, 94, 97. 

N 

National lands, 229. 

Naval Academy, 131. 

Negroes, music of, 95; humor of, 
111-113; religion of, 123. 

New Hampshire, population of, 
20; religious worship, 117; 
crime in, 158; punishments in, 
167; Shakers in, 239. 

New Haven, route to, 51. 

New Jersey, population, 19-21; 
characteristics of people, 38; 
abolished slavery, 39; rehgious 
profession and office tenure, 
118. 

New Orleans, battle of, celebra- 
tion, 3; population, 22; ap- 
pearance of, 30; stage to, 52; 
society in, 71; French actors 
in, 86; opera in, 97; Jews in, 
123; cock-fights in, 180; yel- 
low-fever epidemics, 208-209. 

Newport, Jews in, 123. 

Newspapers, 149-152. 

New York, population, 19-21; 
value of land, 23; manners of 
people, 38; divorce law, 83; 
religious freedom in, 118; Meth- 
odists in, 121; doctors of, 204- 
205; Shakers in, 239; objected 
to Virginia Resolutions, 245. 

New York City, population, 22; 
appearance of, 30; social- Jife 
of, 38, 69; stage hne, 49; op- 
position to playhouses, 88; or- 
chestra in, 89; theater, 90; 
Jewish population, 123; prison 
system in, 192; almshouse in, 
196; Orphan Asylum Society 
organized, 196-197; care for 
the insane, 198-199; schools 
for deaf, dumb, and blind, 199; 
yellow fever in, 208. 

New York Society for Promoting 
Communities, 245. 



294 



INDEX 



Noah, Mordecai M., journalist and 
playwright, 92. 

Norfolk, appearance of, 30; yel- 
low fever in, 208. 

North American Review, 146. 

North Carolina, population of, 20; 
value of land in, 23; character- 
istics of, 35-37 ; early marriages 
in, 77; excluded non-Christians 
from office, 118; Methodists in, 
121; legal punishments in, 159; 
discusses disunion, 252. 

Norwich University, 132. 

O 

"Octagon House" in Washing- 
ton, 4. 

Ohio, 17; admission to Union, 17; 
population, 20; characteristics 
of people, 38 ; Shakers in, 239. 

Oldmixon, Mrs., actress, 89. 

O'Neil's Tavern, Washington, 52. 

Opera, 97. 

Orchestra, 89. 

Outlaws, 165. 

Owen, Robert, 245-246. 



Paine, Robert Treat, signer, 87. 
Paine, Thomas, American writer, 

87. 
Paine, Tom, English writer, m- 

fiuence of writings in United 

States, 118-119. 
Panama Canal proposed, 25. 
Parkinson's writings on America, 

28. 
Parties, origin, 1 1. 
Partridge, Capt. Alden, academy 

of, 132-133. 
Paterson, Wm., in Senate, 256. 
Patriotism, 273-279, 
Patterson, Commander Daniel T., 

U.S.N., 162. 
Paulding, James Kirke, author, 

145- 
Peace, news of, 2. 
Peales, the, portrait-painters, 85. 
Penn, William, does away with 

death-penalty, 189. 



Pennsylvania, population, 19-20; 
manufactories, 24; character- 
istics of people, 38; abolished 
slavery, 39; labor in, loi; 
denies rights to atheists, 118; 
poor-law of, 195-196; hospital 
for the insane, 198; other hos- 
pitals, 200. 

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine 
Arts, organized, 85. 

Pennsylvania, University of, 129. 

Periodicals, 144-146. 

Perth Amboy, steamboat line to, 

51. 

Philadelphia, population of, 22; 
appearance, 30; trade, 38; 
stage line, 49; society, 68; or- 
chestra and theater, 89-90; 
Jews in, 123; first almshouse, 
196; Female Charitable Society, 
197; doctors, 203; yeUow fever 
in, 208-209. 

Phile, Philip, composer, 94. 

Physick, Dr. Philip S., 203, 213. 

Piano-makers, 96. 

Pickering, Timothy, of Massa- 
chusetts, 8. 

Pinckney, Charles, influence' of, 

9- 

Pinkney, William, Attorney-Gen- 
eral, 9. 
Piracy and pirates, 160-165. 
Pise, Charles C, chaplain of 

Senate, 115. 
Placide, actor-manager's benefit, 

90-91. 
Population of United States, 19; 

of different states, 20. 
Porter, Commodore David, 161. 
Portfolio, The, 146. 
Postage, cost of, 54. 
Post-roads, 52, 
Poverty and methods of relief, 

194-200. 
Presbyterians, disapprobation of 

the theater, 86; growth of 

church, 122. 
President, the, 259, 272. 
Prices of food, 101-102. 
Princeton College, 55. 
Princeton University, 128-129. 
Prisons, 188-193. 



295 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



Prize-fights, i8i. 
Providence, population, 22. 

Q 

Quakers, avoidance of theaters, 
86. 

Quincy, Josiah, threatened dis- 
union, 252. 



R 



Racing, 175-180. 

Raleigh, society in, 71. 

Ramsey, David, on slavery, 42. 

Randolph, Mrs., 60. 

Randolph -Macon College, 128. 

Rai^p, George, founder of Har- 
mony Society, 242-243, 245. 

Read, George, in Senate, 256. 

Rcinagle, Alexander, conductor of 
Philadelphia orchestra, 89, 97. 

Religion, 1 14-123. 

Religious denominations in differ- 
ent states, 123. 

Rhode Island, value of land in, 23 ; 
restricts religious freedom, 118. 

Richmond, stage at, 51; Bell 
Tavern in, 52; theaters in, 86- 
87; taste for foreign plays, 92. 

Roads, condition of, 52. 

Robbinstown, stage, 52. 

Roman Catholics, increase of, in 
United States, and the theater, 
86; 122. 

Rush, Dr. Benjamin, most in- 
fluential physician of the coun- 
try, 202-207, 210. 

Rush, Richard, Attorney-General, 
9, 270; Comptroller of the 
Treasury, 268. 

Rush, William, sculptor, 85. 



Sabbath-breaking, 183-186. 
Salem, population of, 22. 
Salmagundi, 145. 
Savannah, society in, 71; Jews 

in, 123; yellow fever in, 208. 
Savarin, Anthclme Brillat, French 

exile, 219-220. 



School-books, 137-138.' 

Scotch in the United States, 19. 

Sea travel, routes, 54. 

Sectionalism, 46, 48. 

Semmes's Tavern, Georgetown, 
52. 

Separation of church and state, 
115-116. 

Separatists, the, 244. 

Servants, 102. 

Shakers, 239-242. 

Shawanee Indians, 21. 

Shining Mountains, 16, 18. 

Shippen, Dr. William, 213. 

Shipping, 230. 

Singers and songs, 94-97. 

Slaveholders, power of, 44. 

Slavery, 39-47; abolition meas- 
ures, 232-238. 

Slaves, population, 19, 21; as 
household servants, 102. 

Smallpox, 207. 

Smith, Samuel Harrison, organizes 
dancing assembly, 67. 

Smith, Mrs. Samuel Harrison, 

74- 

Society of Artists of the United 
States, organized, 85. 

Sonneck, Oscar G., on American 
music, 94. 

South Carolina, population, 20; 
value of land in, 23; character- 
istics of people, 36; society of, 
71; no divorce, 83; Methodists 
in, 121; threatens disunion, 
252. 

South Carolina, University of, 
128-129. 

Southern Literary Messenger, 146. 

Southern Review, The, 146. 

Stage travel, 49-53. 

Steamboat construction, 55-56. 

Steamboat routes, 50-51. 

Stevens, John, applied for rail- 
way charter, 56. 

St. Mary's, stage to, 52. 

Stuart, Gilbert, portrait - painter, 

85. 

Sumter, Thomas, Jr., a slave- 
holder, 43. 

Superstitions, 105. 

Surgery, 212-213. 



296 



INDEX 



Swedes in United States, 20. 
Swiss in United States, 20. 



Taxes, loi. 

Tayloe, Col. John, places house at 
disposal of President Madison, 

4- 

Taylor, John, Senator, 250-251. 

Teachers' salaries, 136. 

Temperance societies, first, 173. 

Tennessee, admission, 17; slave 
population, 21; characteristics 
of people, 38; restriction of 
religious freedom in, 1 18; Meth- 
odists in, 121. 

Theater, the, in United States, 
86-92. 

Thomdike, Israel, Boston shipper, 
230. 

Thornton, William, and negro 
colonization, 234-235. 

Thornton, Dr. William, architect, 
4, 85; steamboat, 56; organized 
dancing assembly, 67. 

Tingey, Capt. Thomas, organized 
dancing assembly, 67. 

Titles, 58-59. 

Toasts, 225-226. 

Tobacco, use of, 32. 

Transportation, 48-57. 

Travel, difficulties, 48 ; expense of, 

52-54- 
Treaty of peace, arrival of, i ; 

terms of, 5. 
Trenton, stage to, 49. 
Trumbull, John, painter, 85. 

u 

Unitarianism, beginnings of, 122. 
United States, boimdaries of, in 

1783, 15-16; divisions, 17; 

population, 19-22. 



Value of land, 23. 

Van Buren, Martin, in Senate, 

257- 
Van Ness, John Peter, organized 
dancing assemblies, 67. 



Vermont, admission to Union, 17; 
favored revealed rehgion, 117. 

Vice, 1 71-187. 

Vining, John, in Senate, 257. 

Virginia, population, 20-21 ; value 
of land in, 23; characteristics 
of people, 35; influence of 
Capital on, 48-49; punishments 
in, 84; religious freedom in, 118; 
religious revivals in, 120; Meth- 
odists in, 121; colleges in, 127; 
crimes in, 157; racing interests, 
177; discusses disunion, 252. 

Virginia and Kentucky Resolu- 
tions, 255. 

Virginia Bill of Rights, the, 116, 

Virginia, University of, 127, 129. 

W 

Waddell, Rev. Moses, academy 
of, 132. 

Wages, loo-ioi. 

War of 181 2, causes of, 4. 

Warren, Dr. John ColUns, 204. 

Warville, Brissot de, interested in 
negro colonization, 235. 

Washington, reception of news 
of Treaty of Ghent, 3-7; ap- 
pearance of, 30; stage at, 51- 
52; social life of, 64-67; ser- 
vants in, 102; horse-racing at, 
179; charitable institutions, 
197-198, 

Washington, Bushrod, 236. 

Washington, George, proclama- 
tion of, 114; Farewell Address, 
116; illness of, 201; artificial 
teeth, 212. 

Washington and liCe University, 
127. 

Waterhouse, Dr. Benjamin, 207. 

Waverley novels, 125. 

Webster, Daniel, in Senate, 257. 

Webster, Noah, educational cam- 
paign of, 139-142. 

Weekly Magazine, The, Boston, 
144-145. 

Welsh in United States, 20. 

White House, society in, 60. 

Whitlock, Mrs., actress, 89. 

Whitman, Walt, on slavery, 41. 



297 



LIFE IN AMERICA ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO 



William and Mary College, 127, 
129. 

Williams, Col. Ephraim, founder 
of Williams CoUege, 128. 

Williams College, 128, 129. 

Wilmington, society in, 71; yel- 
low fever in, 208. 

Wisconsin, 17. 

Wistar, Dr., of Philadelphia, 108. 

Wollstonecraft, Mary, influence 
of her writings in America, 81- 
82. 

Women in slave states, 44; in- 
fluence in politics, 74; domestic- 



ity of, 75-76; education of, 76- 
77; orthodox in religion, 77; 
literary taste of, 79-81. 
Wyandot Indians, 21. 



Yale University, 55, 128-129. 
Yellow-fever epidemics, 208-209. 

Z 

Zion Church in New York, 121. 



THE END 



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